Singin' In The Rain (1952)

SINGIN' IN THE RAIN (1952)

By Ralph Santini - ****

“Singin In The Rain” is not only, as stated by many others, the best musical ever made but also, to my mind, the most joyous ever. I don’t think I can figure any other musical that can be better than this iconic gem because it contains an excellent storyline that concerns Hollywood’s struggle to convert to talkies during the final days of silent film, plus many memorable songs ranging from “Make ‘Em Laugh”, “Good Morning”, and especially the eponymous musical moment where Gene Kelly goes enjoying his happiest moment when, are you ready for this, it rains. What’s better than the songs is the excellent choreography by the films directors, including Mr. Kelly himself, and the one and only Stanley Donen.  

It’s 1927 and a fictional major studio called Monumental Pictures is premiering is biggest hit yet, “The Royal Rascal” where it’s covered by a gossip radio columnist named Olga where everyone is cheering for all celebrities present, save the pianist Cosmo Brown (Donald O’Connor, hilarious and terrific), but most frantically Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly, better than ever) and Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen, hysterically funny with her screechy voice in this movie). Lockwood goes narrating his origins by making up a rather fake story by using his personal motto “dignity, always dignity”, only to reveal with brief flashbacks in orphanhood with Cosmo resulting in petty breaking and entering into many clubs and movie houses when young, learning to play only hot music, doing very bad vaudeville up to telling the truth about their call from Monumental the studio where he won a contract, after becoming a successful stuntman where he made his humble beginnings in the movie business. The one main problem about his employment with Monumental is that he really doesn’t get along with Lina Lamont herself and that’s the biggest white lie that Lockwood makes during his speech at his new movie premiere. What’s worse is that fan-magazine gossip is rumoring him for publicity that he is in love with miss Lamont and that’s not true whatsoever.

Later when the movie premiere has ended Lockwood and his colleagues are ordered to participate in a party, he goes his own way but his car has a flat tire and, get this, is wildly chased by a frantic mob of teenage fans and only gets away by jumping into the car of a young lady named Kathy Selden (The ever cute Debbie Reynolds, absolutely delightful) but at first gets frightened by his presence by mistaking him for a gangster but that’s mended by a traffic cop who knows that Don Lockwood is a movie star and she later gives him a ride apologizing for what she did, but things don’t really get better as Kathy reveals Don that she is a stage actress and doesn’t think movies are impressive since there was still no dialogue to be found during our story. But then when Don finally arrives late to the party he and his colleagues first witness a short filmed demonstration of a talking picture where it’s a first considered a toy, a scream, vulgar and even Don Lockwood’s own director Roscoe Dexter (Douglas Fowley) insinuates that it won’t “amount to a thing” but R.F. Simson (Millard Mitchell, energetic) disagrees when since knowing that Warner Bros. is on with the first feature film to use talking, “The Jazz Singer”. Another thing that occurs in the party is that Don Lockwood again meets with Kathy Selden who was hired by Monumental to a dance show but he keeps teasing her on her wanting to go the stage in New York City but all that’s interrupted when a jealous Lina Lamont goes around questioning Don Lockwood’s interaction with Kathy until she tries hitting Don with a Cake but he ducks and instead hits miss Lamont herself by accident. All of this leads to more great excitement later in the story about Don Lockwood’s increasing romance with Kathy Selden, Monumental’s struggle to convert to talking pictures after the success of “The Jazz Singer”, the beginning of Lina Lamont’s bad news towards her fame, and a lot more to come.

What really makes “Singin In The Rain” so memorable is that Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen knew how to handle very well all the musical numbers from borrowing many MGM musical songs to this movie and convert it into a superior technicolor version of the Broadway Melody films from the 1930s by becoming the screen’s all-time finest musical as stated by many who love this movie. Other brilliant assets in this movie is how Betty Comden and Adolphe Green wanted to make a movie about Hollywood’s conversion to talkies and a brilliant tribute to the making of earlier movie musicals during a time when they became a great sensation. And enough talk about Technicolor photography, Harold Rosson’s cinematographic direction is beautiful, he managed to make what I call a lost 1930s technicolor musical that basically made a dream come true. Credit must also go to producer Arthur Freed. His life was really music and I consider him to be the definitive father of cinematic musicals because in the years before being an excellent musical producer he had his humble beginnings in music by being once a songwriter himself.

“Singin In the Rain” is really pure magic. I don’t think there is any denying the constant awarding as the best Hollywood musical ever made because, I think it really is. With so much great choreography and brilliant casting, it deserves to be a memorable and joyous musical movie classic. That’s what makes Gene Kelly a pure genius with his tremendous collaboration with Stanley Donen because thanks to both of them this movie is really a joyous musical extravaganza.