Swing High (1930) User Reviews

Helen Twelvetrees, Trapeze Artist

[boblipton · 6/10 · 9 January 2020]

Helen Twelvetrees is a trapeze artist in the circus about 1880. She is in love with handsome singer Fred Scott. However new ringmaster Bryant Washburn has talked owner George Fawcett into hiring Dorothy Burgess... and the two of them, unknown to the honest and kindly Fawcett, are about to practice every deceit and swindle that the traveling midway was notorious for in the 19th Century.

Joseph Santley directs this circus musical with an eye and ear for the big screen, with many well-known movie comics of the era crowding the screen for a few moments each. Some have not aged well - Stepin Fetchit has a sizable part - but don't blink lest you miss Chester Conklin or Ben Turpin. Other former Sennett regulars include Daphne Pollard and 'Little Billy' Rhodes.

Fred Scott may be remembered as a singing cowboy, but he was a resident baritone at the San Francisco Opera. After he retired to a different career, he told an interviewer he had a deal with horses: he didn't get on their backs and they didn't sell real estate. He hung up his cinematic spurs in 1942, and lived until 1991 and the age of 89.

Helen More Than Fulfilled Pathe's Faith in Her!!!

[kidboots · 7/10 · 15 April 2013]

Pathe had so much faith in it's two newest signings (Helen Twelvetrees and Fred Scott) that 4 months after introducing them in "The Grand Parade" they were re-teamed in a circus story with songs "Swing High". Helen more than went on to justify the faith the studio had in her but Scott eventually ended up as a singing cowboy, he had a lusty singing voice but no "special something". The supporting cast was mainly made up of old timers (Dot Farley, George Fawcett, Chester Conklin and Ben Turpin) and a couple of youngsters who the year before probably thought their ship had come in. Sally Starr was an MGM discovery, talked about as a pocket sized version of Clara Bow. In January 1930 she was giving interviews about her method of cracking the big time - early to bed, no night clubbing until after she's a big star but unfortunately it didn't work because by May she was struggling in the supporting players of "Swing High". Roumanian born Nick Stuart was given even less to do but the year before he had leads!!!

The story was set in 1880 and was all about the life and loves of a troupe of travelling circus players of whom the star is aerialist Maryan (Twelvetrees). Garry (Scott) is a singer in a medicine man show and his rendition of "My Guitar and You" brings him and Maryan together and also convinces her that the two shows should combine. With the joy of being around Garry (he agrees and thinks "There's Happiness Over the Hill") comes change and heartache. Maryan's trapeze partner, Ruth (Starr) and Billy (Stuart) are keen to marry and leave the show so enter vampy Miss Trixie (Dorothy Burgess). She catches the eye of Major Tiny (Little Billy), the circus midget, and is very scathing to him - until she sees his bank book!! She spins the old yarn about a sick grandmother and before you know it he has given her all his savings and serenaded her with a particularly creepy song "Do You Think I Can Grow On You". Their strange "affair" is reminiscent of the much more sinister pairing in "Freaks" (1932).

Gary has a vice - he is a gambler and when Maryan is off recuperating from a fall (he has just sung her another dreary love song "It Must Be Love", in his very fruity baritone, there are close-ups of Helen biting her lips, trying to hold back the tears - she must have wanted to scream!!) - he goes to the dogs. When the circus payroll goes missing he is the chief suspect and there are more thrills in the last 15 minutes when Maryan overhears a conversation and wrangles a confession from the real thief the only way she knows how, up on the high wire!!!

The performance of Stepin Fetchit may be cringeworthy but he was one of the first black actors to gain a foothold in Hollywood. He had perfected the character of the slow moving, slow speaking servant, always a slave to the whims of the white folk, from his stage days but in later years was vilified for his caricatures. On the other hand an unbilled Clarence Muse (who enhanced every film he appeared in) had the best moment in the movie with his spirited spiritual "Shoo the Hoodoo Away".

Quite Hammersteinian

[marcslope · 7/10 · 17 March 2014]

A fairly ambitious Pathe musical from 1930, set in a traveling circus of the 1880s, this one's no neglected masterpiece, but it does show how quickly the talkies were learning to tell stories with, and through, song. A barely-singing Helen Twelvetrees is the put-upon heroine, wooed by nice-but-weak Fred Scott, and threatened by an unscrupulous Dorothy Burgess, who played this kind of part over and over, and well. The emphasis is on how the circus is a real community, an extended family, with good guys and bad guys, and on the strong woman/weak man pairing, and Helen's Cap'n Andy-like protector. I'm guessing Pathe had Show Boat in mind quite a lot when they made this. The songs aren't Kern quality, but they're OK, and there's at least a passing relationship between some of them and the plot. It's more than capably directed by Joseph Santley, nicely shot, and has some fun supporting players, including Stepin Fetchit, who's alternately delightful and cringe-inducing. There's an exciting if predictable climax, and Scott, who later became both a singing cowboy and an opera star, while goofy-looking, partners well with the delicate Ms. Twelvetrees. Among forgotten musicals of 1930, and there are many, this is one of the more impressive.

Great start, tiresome middle, melodramatic finish!

[JohnHowardReid · 7/10 · 8 August 2012]

SYNOPSIS: Uninvited, a medicine show tags along with a traveling carnival and draws customers away, much to the displeasure of the carnival's ringmaster, who threatens the medicine show with violence. However, Maryan, the daughter of the carnival's owner, persuades her father to offer the medicine show people (Doc May and his wife, plus Garry, a singer) a role in the carnival instead. Needless to say, romance soon blossoms between Maryan and Garry, but Trixie – Maryan's partner in an aerial act – also has eyes for Garry and decides to sabotage this love affair.

COMMENT: Exuberantly produced on a budget which seems to have no limits, director, Joseph Santley does wonders with the first reel of this movie and for a while there, it seems we are in for a real treat. Our expectations are savaged, however, right at the beginning of the second reel when the camera focuses on, of all people, that disgrace to the entire acting profession, that squirmingly unfunny "comedian", Stepin Fetchit. In the space of one or two minutes, Mr Fetchit manages to efface all the goodwill inspired by the first reel. The movie never recovers, even though there are some good scenes ahead with both Fred Scott and Little Billy.

For some reason, the normally super-lovely, super-lively Dorothy Burgess is somewhat muted here, even though she has a main role to carry. No doubt producer and director were bending themselves double to "protect" Helen Twelvetrees, who looks old and haggard, and whose acting is more reminiscent of a silent photoplay than a sound film. A rather hammy and unlikely turn of the screw in the plot at the climax doesn't help either.

The movie still has its moments, but never regains the heights of that first tuneful, crowded with extras, slyly satirical first reel.

AVAILABLE on a middling DVD from Grapevine. The all-important first reel, most fortunately, is great, but quality tends to trickle downhill from there. Also the movie has been cut from 92 minutes to a mere 75. But maybe this is our good fortune. I suspect that more than a few of those missing minutes featured Mr Fetchit, who is given a tiresomely long-winded introductory scene but then virtually disappears. Also short-changed is Ben Turpin who "enjoys" a couple of fleeting close-ups -- and that's all!

These girls fly through the air with the greatest of ease...

[mark.waltz · 5/10 · 21 November 2013]

There's jealousy amongst the lovely trapeze ladies in this circus musical melodrama which is very similar in nature to the same year's "Dangerous Curves", starring Clara Bow, Richard Arlen and Kay Francis. Romantic duets and Negro spirituals (as they were called back then) interrupt the drama every five minutes in this story of the vixen (Dorothy Burgess) who threatens to come between circus sweethearts Helen Twelvetrees and Fred Scott, as well as the mystery of who has been embezzling from the coffers. While the romantic duets may threaten your ability to stay awake, a production number (with the black servants putting together the circus tent while singing) is spectacularly staged. I found Stepin Fetchit's slow drawl difficult to understand at times (and slightly off-putting) but other character performers were rich in characterization. The finale where the villain is confronted is spectacularly suspenseful and makes up for the slow spots. But for a low budget film this early in the sound era, it is surprisingly lavish and overstocked with extras in the key circus scenes.

Painfully Dull

[view_and_review · 3/10 · 4 February 2024]

"Swing High" is a bit of a musical, or I'll say that there are a couple of musical numbers in it. "Swing High" is the very epitome of what a bad musical is: a guy or gal with a terrible voice belting out tunes.

The vocal criminal in this movie was Gary (Fred Scott). Boy, was his singing awful. Yet, he kept on singing. And for some reason his singing had Maryan Garner (Helen Twelvetrees) swooning. He sang some offkey notes and she'd fall more and more in love.

The two of them worked for Garner's Circus run by Maryan's father, Pop (George Fawcett). The biggest drama was between Maryan and Gary as they pussyfooted around trying to drop subtle hints about their feelings for one another. Then Trixie (Dorothy Burgess) entered the circus.

Trixie was a partner of Ringmaster Joe (Bryant Washburn). She joined the Garner Circus and right away she was a problem. She was flirty with Gary and mean to Major Tiny ('Little Billy' Rhodes), a small person, until she realized he had money.

Maryan caught her crush Gary kissing Trixie while the two were playing a game of cards. He was paying up on a bet, but Maryan saw what she saw. It was a silly situation that was very contrived, but here we were with a heartbroken Maryan and an oblivious Gary. Maryan was so broken up over it she fell from a trapeze which reminded me of the movie "Polly of the Circus" when Polly (Marion Davies) was about to end her life via trapeze if she couldn't be with her lover, Rev. John Hartley (Clark Gable).

Maryan got off very lucky after her fall and only suffered a mildly injured arm. She was put into a sling, but she tore that sling off (ala Dwayne Johnson in Fast and Furious 20) after a couple of days and was back on the trapeze in order to force some information out of Trixie.

Gary was mixed up in a situation that Trixie knew about. While Maryan was recovering from her injury and miffed at Gary, Gary was accused of stealing from Pop Garner. He was entrusted to deposit a couple bags of money and a bag came up missing. He was the only one with the opportunity to steal it so he was arrested for theft.

Soon after, Trixie came waltzing into the circus with a brand new dress. Furthermore she was back to being mean to Major Tiny, which meant she no longer needed his gifts. Maryan put two and two together and concluded that Trixie had stolen the money. To force the information out of her she went on the trapeze with Trixie and held her aloft in one of their stunts until Trixie came clean. It was as contrived as the kiss between Trixie and Gary.

"Swing High" was desperate for drama and didn't know how to go about creating it in a reasonable manner so we got this clunky mess. There was nothing captivating or even interesting about this movie. It was so basic and uncreative it strained the dulled senses.

Of note in the movie was Stepin Fetchit. This was a name that I'd heard for years and it was never accompanied by anything good to say with it. Stepin Fetchit had always been synonymous with Sambo or Uncle Tom. After watching him in "Swing High" I know why. He was an embarrassment. He spoke like someone who'd been kicked in the head by a horse. His mouth barely moved and his voice was whiny, making him very hard to understand. So a movie that was painfully dull added painfully offensive to it as well.

Free on Odnoklassniki.

Stepin Fetchit Breathes Live Into This Musical

[hhbooker2 · 10/10 · 8 June 2002]

GREETINGS & SALUTATIONS! "Swing High," (1930) is about a circus aerialist who fights to keep her lover out of the hands of a scheming woman. It stars Chester Conklin, Stepin Fetchit, Helen Twelvetrees, and Ben Turpin. However, it is Stepin Fetchit who breathes life into this musical. Stepin Fetchit was born Lincoln Theodore Monroe Albert Perry in Key West, Florida sometime between 1892 and 1902; the son of a cigar maker. He left home in 1914 to pursue a show business career, joining the Royal American Shows plantation revues. Years later he is said to have taken his stage name from a Baltimore racehorse that had inspired him to write a routine for himself and his stage partner of the time, Ed Lee. They billed themselves as "Step 'n' Fetchit: Two Dancing Fools from Dixie." After splitting with his partner, Fetchit kept the name for himself as he spent long, arduous years in the vaudeville circuit. He provided comic relief in many films during the Depression years. Respectfully yours, Sarge Booker