You'll Never Get Rich

I really enjoyed the first third of this hour-and-a-half movie. However, when Fred Astaire joins the army, the movie switches from dancing to humor, and the humor is not much. His consists mainly of a fellow soldier who is an expert in double talk. He's pretty good but his act wears thin quickly. So, too, does the storyline: lying, lying, and more lying. That's followed by cover-ups, false accusations, people falling in and out of love at the drop of a hat, etc. - you know, typical stupid fare of the day for these kind of films.

Since they were not allowed to pollute the films with profanity and pornography, filmmakers still could promote everything wrong by trivializing adultery, lying, smoking, drinking, cheating and other evils. This movie, like a lot of comedies of the day, gives numerous examples of that. Too bad, because it looked like it was going to be a great film, at least in the dancing of Astaire and Hayworth in the beginning. Those two were great to watch. Hayworth, known more for her glamor, was actually a great dancer and reportedly Astaire's favorite partner. No arguments there! Rita looks fantastic and Astaire's stepping is always perfection.

Unfortunately, in Fred's films they had to have a story go along with his dancing. I only give it five points to see Rita.