Live Action Musical Movie Hall of Fame

We reach a milestone!

We now have all 10 of the movies with at least 1 review for each.

And we reach another milestone, Gideon has reviewed all 10 movies!

great lil review Gideon! Rochefort does look like all kinds of fun when I stole a peek as it was being recorded on my DVR.

YAY, two milestones with ONE review!!

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Chitty Chitty Bang Bang


Our fine four-fendered friend!

As previously stated, I'm gonna pretty much gush and rave about this film that I have watched countless times as a child, as a teenager and only a number of times throughout my adult life; and, viewing it, I would always finding my way back to that pleasure of when I was a kid watching this. On those times I did not, I would reprimand myself for a promise made in my youth: I'd grow old, but I would not grow up.

The original story is written by James Bond's creator; Ian Fleming for his son; though, like countless other times when a novel makes it to the screen, the film is NOT the novel and for me, that is not a terrible thing.
Because the additional parts, specifically the entire Vulgaria and all the characters involved were brought in by the screenwriter, Roald Dahl which are my favorite parts of the entire movie.
From the two bumbling spies, the toy loving Baron Bomburst, Benny Hill playing the Toy Maker, the prisoners/Inventors, the hilarious court especially the Councilor and his funny, well-delivered lines to, yes, the Child Catcher. Whom I was utterly terrified of as a kid and as I grew older enjoyed his evilness with utter glee.

While everyone knows the title song to the point of parody there are a number of lesser songs that I still completely enjoy.
At the top of that list is "Posh!" sung by Grandpa Potts from his. . . "laboratory" in the midst of being kidnapped and also "The Roses of Success" which is a great lil song about failures are, truly, blessings, since they lead you to success. And of course, early in the movie, "Me Ole Bamboo" which is just all kinds of catchy fun.

Yes, yes, I know, this is a kid film and it does have it's share of saccharine, but I don't care -- the child in me gets giddy when I watch it and that makes this old b@stard smile.

Thanks for nominating this old favorite, @Clazor

The Pajama Game (1957)

I have a new favorite! That's what I love about Hofs, I find really neat movies that I've never seen before. I loved how this movie felt like going to a Broadway show. I don't recall ever seeing a move that was literally lifted from the stage, and put onto film. Even most of the original cast and production crew came along to make the movie.

I'm so enthusiastic about this movie, that I did something I normally never do...I watched it twice, two nights in a row. You know what? It's much better the second time around, as I knew the songs and the characters and the story line..so I could focus more on the sheer fun of the movie. And this is a fun, splashy movie, with simple but very efficient sets, that adds to the Broadway feel of the movie.

The Pajama Game does something I've never seen in another movie, it uses lighting fixtures as part of the set decor. Think about it, when is the last time you seen a light bulb in a movie, on, and being deliberately used as part of the set decoration. Almost every scene in this movie includes ceiling lights, desk lights and neon signs! The neon is everywhere and adds a brilliant splash to the film.

What's more splashy in a 1950s movie than neon? The costumes! Just look at the women and what they are wearing. They're very colorful, with stripes and patterns and polka dots. They're wearing contrasting color as accents and they're chic and at the same time frivolously riotous looking. Lots of visual eye candy in this film.

I loved all the numbers especially Racing With the Clock done at the start of the film in the factory and later reprise during the work slowdown. It's a great song and the choreography with the movement of the workers, was neat to see.

Loved the big splashy picnic scene and the song Once A Year Day. Carol Haney is a real stand out in this number and in the show stopper Steam Heat, and in Hernando's Hideaway, which is so creatively choreographed by Bob Fosse, the silhouetted chorus lit by matches was brilliant. Carol Haney is such a talent, she's funny as heck and the liveliest character around, she's a superb dancer and while she might not match Doris Day's silky voice, she has a presence to her singing that I really liked.

I like Doris Day here, I always like Doris. She doesn't get to develop her character as much as usual, but she has some great songs. Loved the comic song, There Once Was a Man, and the heart breaking Hey There, which is a classic. Wow, Doris looked great in the picnic scene, well she looked great in the entire film, so did everywhere.

If there was one thing I wasn't big on was John Raitt, he's one helluva baritone singer, but he didn't bring much personality to the role. This is his only lead role in a movie. I wish Howard Keel could have done his part.

Great nomination GBG, I enjoyed it!

Oh almost forgot to mention my favorite set piece, the pale pink 50s refrigerator with the big chrome handle, way cool!

I glad you liked The Pajama Game so much. I agree with everything in your review except the part about John Raitt. I loved him in this movie, and I wish he had made more movies. (Just a bit of trivia. His daughter is singer Bonnie Raitt.)

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Bonnie Raitt's dad? Very cool!!

Enjoyed the review CR! There's so many films I'm geeked to see in both of these HoF's, this one included.

Interesting I didn't know that Ian Fleming wrote the story for his son. I didn't even know this was based on a novel until the Hof started. I learn stuff all the time! The castle scenes in Vulgaria are pretty cool, so I'm glad that was added into the movie. Did you have any other musicals as a childhood favorite?

besides all the Walt Disney animated movies that seemed to have songs splashed about them, there was Oliver!, Doctor Dolittle, Willy Wonka, Scrooge with Albert Finney, Jesus Christ Superstar and Godspell. Saw The Who's Tommy for the first time at the movies as a kid - it freaked me out during the parts with the abusive cousin and of course loved it as a teenager. Fiddler on the Roof, Hair, and I'd be a liar if I didn't say I watched Sound of Music when it came on TV as a kid. Oh, and of course, Wizard of Oz.

Those were the ones that came out around my youth that I watched every time they were on TV and continued to, except for SoM which fell to the wayside around my teens. The rest I liked even more as I got older.

Sorry for the late reply, Ed...our post missed each other. I often post then sign off.

That's quite the list! I'm sure you've heard me mention this before, but I never grew up with watching musicals or movies that kids loved like Wizard of Oz, so I never seen any of those movies until more recently. I still need to see Tommy. One of these days

When I was a kid, born in 64, there were countless Variety Shows on TV and everyone was nostalgic for the MGM musicals, which I rarely watched, for whatever reason and most of these were the next generation of musicals during the 60's and 70's, so as a kid, the musical was kind of hooked into a lot of things. Even the Saturday morning, after school stuff had music incorporated into them. At the time it was usually the pop music of the time with the psychedelic effects and so forth. (No wonder I was so eager to be such a stoner as a teenager lol)

But yeah, a lot of them were played on TV a lot, usually on a yearly basis and the family would sit down and watch 'em. So, stuff like chitty chitty, Wizard of Oz, Oliver!, Dolittle, Sound of Music and like was a bit of a staple as a kid and continued into high school and beyond.

In high school and the years shortly after there were the midnight shows at the local movie theaters showing Tommy, Song Remains The Same, AC/DC's Let There Be Rock and when I was in 10th grade The Wall came out. So, great flicks to get high to back in those daze

Forgot to remark on this, YEP Fleming wrote it for his son and the reason for all the money thrown at this for elaborate sets and so forth was due to the great success of, I think, about three James Bond movies, so far at that time, so the studio was willing to open their wallets up a little wider for this movie.

There are also a couple of actors from the Bond movies in this as well. The Baron; Gert Fröbe played Goldfinger IN Goldfinger, the Baroness; Anna Quayle played Frau Hoffner in Casino Royale and Desmond Llewelyn, who played Coggins, the owner of the junkyard that Chitty was originally in, was Q in countless Bond movies. Q, of course, was the one that gave Bonds all his gadgets for every mission.
(thank you IMDB trivia!!)

It's interesting that you said that you stopped watching The Sound of Music every year because there seems to be something about that movie that it loses after multiple rewatches. Most great musicals have practically endless rewatchability for me, but The Sound of Music is one of the least rewatchable musicals I've seen.

It sounds like you were a deprived child. My mother introduced me to classic movies and musicals when I was very young, which is probably why I love them so much today.

My parents didn't like musicals or classic movies. But I did go to R rated movies during grade school

That would have been the oldest brother (there was 9 of us, I was #7) he did the introduction to a lot of that. My parents loved blue grass/folk music and enjoyed the musicals and variety shows of the time, along with Lawrence Welk.

Well, THANK GOD they had their priorities

1776


Early Skepticism. I was quite sceptical before watching 1776 for the following reasons:
1. I think there is a mighty different approach from American watching the feature and non-American. Why? Let’s put aside the importance and influence in other countries of the very signing the United States Declaration of Independence. We all know how inspirational this historical event was for other countries to do the same. That is not the point. The point is that for American this event, whether he/she wants it or not, will be always resonating and echoing in his heart, brain, ears, memory as I believe this historical moment is a part of any American school curriculum starting from elementary school and throughout a high school or Universities History classes. It is part of your DNA so to speak. This said, non-American will always be lacking the closeness to the story.
2. To tell you the truth, first half of the film I was in front of the great dilemma. I was not sure if it is at all appropriate to have this song intermezzos. Firstly because the acting of cast was excellent and I liked especially William Daniels, he was just amazing and articulate as well as all the others. Secondly I was asking myself, does the signing the United States Declaration of Independence needs to be supplemented with singing? I haven’t seen much musicals so I don’t know if there is any musical on UK, Spanish, German etc. historical events.
3. I only found available the director’s cut version that was 2 hours and 41 minutes long versus the original theatrical release that was 20 minutes shorter and that was my third Skepticism. I was a priori rejecting the feature as for the extensive duration.

Awakening. So, I got ready the film to be played on one screen and I opened Wikipedia article on United States Declaration of Independence and the text of Declaration itself on another screen and start to watch. I’m very interested in history, myself having the classical education, and right from the beginning I liked it, still sceptical about the songs though. But then when I got over the first half and understood the structure of it, I began to think that the songs are actually necessary for to give the story more importance and drama. The songs were actually giving the story more festivity as it has happened already and we now have our independence 241 years. The musical is not saying the story that is happening but the story that already happened centuries ago. Then all my early Skepticism disappeared and I was only enjoying the dialogues and witty remarks of Dr. Benjamin Franklin: “Treason is a charge invented by winners as an excuse for hanging the losers” or “What are you staring at? Haven’t you ever seen a great man before?”. And there was plenty of nice witty remarks fights which is actually very current. Just turn on your parliament life TV channel wherever you are and watch. Only thing you won’t get are songs or synchronized dance. I loved Saltpeter song duet, not sure about the name.



Satisfaction. I found it very dramatic and emotional and songs and dance were just how they supposed to be. I noticed another very interesting thing in the story, but first let me explain how I think one can emphasize a fact. You can either make it the main topic of the whole film and it will be clear for anyone what was it about (of course the signing the United States Declaration of Independence in this case) , and/or you can make it marginal and scarce yet display it in important moments. I am talking about the importance of wives of politicians in making an important decisions, making history. It doesn’t have to be a direct advice, or some legislative review. It is good enough to feel support of your wife (relatives, family in general). It is good enough if a wife is taking care of children and house in times of husband’s being out of house making important decisions for the good of people. And not to mention that women are often inspirational to men and many great decisions are made in evening bedroom talks between wife and husband. It was important to have an understanding and supporting wives, family for great men that signed the document.
I liked the 1776 musical. Do I want to watch it again? Not sure about it. But I certainly want to read some more on the signing the United States Declaration of Independence. Great nomination SilentVamp. Thank you!

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Meet Me in St. Louis

So glad I rewatched this as I had only vague memories of it.

What a colourful, cosy movie. A real Sunday teatime treat. I loved the sets and the costumes.

The dialogue was much more humorous than I expected and I found myself smiling nearly all the way through. I liked Katie and Grandpa the best of the characters. The songs were good, but they didn’t always seem to do much to move the plot forward, they were more like musical interludes.

I didn’t care too much for the Halloween sequence - what awful kids! And how irresponsible the parents were letting such young kids roam around and build fires and derail trolleys! Judy Garland’s fringe was mildly alarming, and the romance was a bit bland.

Nothing really bad ever happens in the world of this movie. In some ways that could be a bit hokey, like the ending, but I can absolutely see why a movie like this was made in the time it was, in the second world war, as a morale-booster, a cheerer-upper, a look back at the good old days that didn’t really exist except in movies like this, and it works. However I think a bit more conflict or a more plausible threat to the family’s happiness would have made a happy ending a bit more deserved.

Altogether, though, I liked it a lot and I would happily have watched it all day, it’s almost a shame it wasn’t another hour longer.

Hi all. Next Musical I'm going to watch is West Side Story. I saw it on TV 15 years ago, maybe even more. I'm wondering how I'm gonna see it after all those years passed.

Hey Nestorio! I see you're on a roll and have watched 5 out of 10, good for you I need to bet my movie watching butt moving and start watching more of these...I just linked your review of 1776 to the 1st post. Good review too! Yeah 1776 is unique, where else can you get early American history and music at the same time. Glad you liked it.

Thursday glad to hear you liked my nom, I actually haven't seen it for awhile but they way you describe it, is how I remember it. I especially liked the part where you say, "I found myself smiling nearly all the way through"...That's what I loved about Meet Me in St Louis.