Brigadoon (1954)

Director:

Vincente Minnelli

Writers:

Alan Jay Lerner (screenplay)
Alan Jay Lerner (musical)

Release Date:

8 September 1954 (USA)

Genre:

Fantasy | Musical | Romance

Tagline:

The Big Broadway Musical Hit!

Plot:

Two Americans on a hunting trip in Scotland become lost. They encounter a small village, not on the map, called Brigadoon, in which people harbor a mysterious secret, and behave as if they were still living two hundred years in the past.

Plot Keywords:

Village | Scotland | Hunting | American | Vacation

Awards:

Nominated for 3 Oscars. Another 1 win

Cast

Gene Kelly	...	Tommy Albright
Van Johnson	...	Jeff Douglas
Cyd Charisse	...	Fiona Campbell
Elaine Stewart	...	Jane Ashton
Barry Jones	...	Mr. Lundie
Hugh Laing	...	Harry Beaton
Albert Sharpe	...	Andrew Campbell
Virginia Bosler	...	Jean Campbell
Jimmy Thompson	...	Charlie Chisholm Dalrymple
Tudor Owen	...	Archie Beaton
Owen McGiveney	...	Angus
Dee Turnell	...	Ann
Dodie Heath	...	Meg Brockie (as Dody Heath)
Eddie Quillan	...	Sandy

Runtime:

108 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Anscocolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

4-Track Stereo | Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Certification:

USA:G (re-rating) (1971) | USA:Passed (National Board of Review) | Australia:G | Finland:S | USA:Approved (PCA #16971) | UK:U

Filming Locations:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios - 10202 W. Washington Blvd., Culver City, California, USA

Company:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Trivia:

The highland backdrops were over 600 feet long, and 60 feet high, and cost $382,280.

Goofs:

Continuity: At the end of "Heather on the Hill", Fiona Campbell drops some heather on the ground when she runs off. When Tommy Albright follows a few seconds later, the bunch of heather has disappeared.

Quotes:

Meg Brockie: I'm highly attracted to you. Why, when I look at you I feel wee tadpoles jumping in my spine.
Jeff Douglas: That's about as repulsive an idea as I've heard in years!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Gilmore Girls: I Can't Get Started (#2.22)" (2002)

Soundtrack:

Finale: Brigadoon

"It's not the heat, it's the humanity!"

And that is exactly the story BRIGADOON tries to tell. Two urbanites from New York, Tommy (Gene Kelly) and Jeff (Van Johnson), are grouse-hunting in Scotland--yes, they've come all the way to Scotland to shoot grouse, if you can believe that to begin with!--when they happen upon the tiny magical little Scottish village of Brigadoon, a (very literal) throwback to the mid-18th century in customs, livelihood and people. The Campbells are holding a wedding for their daughter Jean, whose sister Fiona (Cyd Charisse) is the first person who doesn't treat the strangers like... well, strangers. It doesn't take long, just a walk through 'The Heather On The Hill', for Tommy and Fiona to fall deeply in love. The only problem is that Brigadoon, thanks (or not) to their eager chaplain Mr. Forsythe, surfaces once every hundred years--it's been two hundred since Mr. Forsythe made his 'contract with God', and only two days have passed for the villagefolk in that same year in 1754. The question becomes one of love, of whether one is able to give up everything for a miracle: just as Mr. Forsythe has to give up his beloved Brigadoon to bring it its miracle, Tommy and Fiona, because 'if you love someone deeply enough, anything is possible', get their miracle as well.

There is certainly charm aplenty in BRIGADOON: the morning fair 'Down On MacConnachy Square' is lively and bustling; the beautiful dance between Kelly and Charisse as they gather 'The Heather On The Hill' is tender and beautiful, with more balletic romance than any choreography of Kelly's to date; even the forward girl who tries to turn Jeff's head (only to disappear from the movie thereafter) is cute in her way and her fervent belief that she might actually have a romance like that of her parents. BRIGADOON most certainly sets out to charm--even the general dodginess of the Scottish accents does not really detract from the rest of the film.

However, there is an element of uneasiness in BRIGADOON, perhaps conscious, perhaps not, that somewhat undermines its message. It wants us to believe that it really is the humanity, the *kind* of humanity that one gets in Brigadoon and in New York that makes one place preferable to the other. This is quite unsubtly displayed in the merry dreaminess that surrounds Brigadoon, in contrast with the almost *too* loud chattering that goes on in the New York bar teeming with humanity. Yet one is never quite sure whether Brigadoon is really the utopia it appears to be: this is underscored by the fact that (despite Kelly's pleas for on-location filming in Scotland) the scenery is obviously constructed on a set. It's still eerily beautiful in a fake way, and this is the trouble with the village portrayed in the film. Everything *seems* perfect, idyllic--happy and charming and easy and light. But then you learn the real history of the village, and the aura surrounding it doesn't look so much as magic but as *black* magic. Mr. Forsythe sounds more like an authoritarian dictator obsessed with his Brigadoon than a benign sweet old chaplain, and when Harry Beaton (Hugh Laing) tries to make a break for it, the hunt for him and the subsequent covering up of his death has such sinister undertones that one really starts to feel uncomfortable about what the people have become in the two short days (for them) that they have known about their village's uniqueness.

Of course, the film itself actually states this uneasiness that the audience will feel, not merely suggests it. This is evident in how Tommy performs a gentle reprise of his courtship dance with Fiona and rushes off, full of glee and love, to tell Jeff that he is staying in Brigadoon... only to be persuaded by a few curt sentences from Jeff that he should really give up the love of his lifetime to return to reality, to return to New York. Jeff plays the cynical, hard-headed pragmatist in all of us, and is then immediately depicted as a drunkard who spends all his days lounging in a bar, broken by his own inability to have faith in a 'miracle'. It's fitting for this film full of contradictions that the person who saved Brigadoon was the one who refused to believe it, and that the people of Brigadoon were saved by the death of one of its number.

Perhaps this is far too much analysis than BRIGADOON can bear. If one doesn't poke beyond its shiny, lavish MGM surface (and there really is no need to), then it is merely a star vehicle for Kelly, not a particularly good one, but one that is moderately entertaining and does allow him to showcase his talents (though again, not too effectively). The best number is probably the most famous song in it, 'Almost Like Being In Love', sung by a heart-light and foot-merry Kelly as he dances through a Scottish farm. The runner-up would be the beautiful 'Heather On The Hill' couples ballet--Kelly's ballet training really comes to the fore in BRIGADOON, his other films having been more influenced by tap dancing.

All in all, a charming package with a sinister underside, if one can believe that this shadowy underside to BRIGADOON--both village and film--could exist. 7/10.