I am writing this slightly retrospectively based on what I watched last weekend, as I am still comfortably tucked up in bed with a cup of tea and lots of Internet browsing to do and I have no intention of crawling out of bed until at least mid-day when I really want to go and look at a possible new house.
Anyways this weekends recommendation is a classic, I have never seen it on TV before, but I picked it up on DVD after hearing Dita Von Tease delight (I nearly wrote rave and then realise the she would never rave about anything) about it. It seemed very apt that this be my selection so soon after the Oscars as "The Great Ziegfeld" was nominated for 7 Oscars and won 3 Oscars (Best Film, Best Actress and Best Dance Sequence). On its release in 1939 the film was a biopic of the life of the amazing showman Florenz Ziegfeld Jr, depicting how he built his career/business out of nothing only to never really have it. The film lasts nearly 3 hours with a intermission somewhere in the middle and for me the first half is particularly slow when listening to his first wife temperamentally throw fits of insecurity and jealousy, a role for which Luise Rainer won herself a best actress award!
For me the highlights where the amazing costumes by Adrian "Adolph Greenberg", I am a big fan of his work he did the costumes in The Wizard of Oz and Philadelphia Story to name but a few of his creations. If you watch the film you will know there are simply hundreds of gown and millions of sequins, the time and effort that must have gone into the costumes of this film just doesn't happen in modern day films.
Then there is the 8m minute dance sequence to "A pretty girl is like a melody" it was filmed in 2 takes, included 180 performers, used 4,300 yard of silk rayon in the curtains and cost $220,000. It is AMAZING!!
The final film cost $2 million to make, a huge sum of money, but it did go on make $40 million.
It is and oldie but a goodie!
xo
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