Follow the Fleet
by Friz Freleng, Joseph Henabery, Mark Sandrich
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Astrid Allwyn, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Harriet Hilliard, Randolph ScottDirector: Friz Freleng, Joseph Henabery, Mark Sandrich
Brand: ASTAIRE,FRED
Producer: Leon Schlesinger
Producer: Pandro S. Berman
Writer: Allan Scott
Writer: Dwight Taylor
Writer: Hubert Osborne
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, DVD, NTSC, Original recording remastered, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 110 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2005-08-16
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Turner Home Ent
Movie Reviews of Follow the Fleet
Movie Review: Face the Music and Dance
Summary: 5 Stars
Fans who are used to seeing Fred and Ginger as high society types (or those who through lucky circumstances rubbed elbows with the same) get something a bit different in this flick which puts both Fred and Ginger in the "working stiff" category. Former dance partners, they have been separated because she wanted to go on to bigger things (do I sense a hit of their own lives creeping into the plot) and as a result Fred has up and joined the Navy. It makes for some good shots on the ship and tender--and a chance for both of them to wear nautical garb in their scenes.
On board ship, Fred leads the jazz band he created in a piece called "I'd Rather Lead a Band" and a ditty with lyric witty, "We Saw the Sea".
Ginger has a sister played by Harriett Hilliard before she became half of Ozzie and Harriett - and Fred has as his Navy pal the charming and cocky Randolph Scott. This harkens back to their first film FLYING DOWN TO RIO and the mildly disappointing ROBERTA by making Ginger and Fred not the only stars. So for us, the film seem more of an "ensemble cast" oeuvre but no matter. The other stars do just fine and Harriett more or less morphs from ugly duckling to almost-swan with the help of Ginger and her dance hall coworker Lucille Ball. As a result of compiling to their ministrations, Harriett gets to sing not one but two love ballads (the pensive "Get Thee Behind Me Satan" and plaintive "But Where are You?"), and in that radio gal of the Thirties style, she does just fine. Otherwise the numbers are Fred's or Ginger's or both.
Finding former partner Ginger now working in a dance hall, Fred gets to hear her sing and dance "Let Yourself Go", win a dance contest and lose Ginger's job for her all in one crack. He promises he will get a better job for her but when she is in an audition he arranged, he shows up and thinks someone else is in there about to get hired and so spikes her glass of water with baking soda. Ginger cannot complete her number and that job is kaput, too.
Later, they decide to put on a show (I guess Mickey and Judy were busy that day) and they rehearse a number called "I'm Putting All My Eggs in One Basket" in what are surely their own street clothes complete with Fred's tie-for-belt signature look. Ginger looks cute in slacks and we get to see her footwork, if not those shapely calves. This is another of their anything-you-can-do-I-can do novelty numbers and it works splendidly.
The show they put on has as its' dream sequence style centerpiece a number that harkens back to their elegantly dressed roles in SWING TIME. As the sequence goes, Fred loses all he has at cards and Ginger is similarly having a bad evening and about to end it all when they manage to find one another and work out their situation in the gorgeously choreographed "Let's Face the Music and Dance". It ranks up there with "Never Gonna Dance" in SWING TIME and "Cheek to Cheek" in TOP HAT for utter chic. Ginger's beaded gown is a stunner but it has sleeves so weighty it brings new meaning to the phrase armed and dangerous. They did Fred some minor injury as they whipped around...
All ends well--after all this is an RKO radio picture. Have fun watching!
Summary of Follow the Fleet
A song and dance man joins the Navy with a pal and meets two sisters in need of help.Genre: Musicals
Rating: NR
Release Date: 16-AUG-2005
Media Type: DVD
Of the nine films Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers completed for RKO Pictures, Follow the Fleet falls short of the top echelon. Coming between series peaks Top Hat and Swing Time, Fleet repeats the mistake (à la Flying Down to Rio and Roberta) of casting Fred and Ginger as the comic couple, while the romantic roles went to Randolph Scott and Harriet Hilliard (before she went on to fame with her husband, Ozzie Nelson, in Ozzie and Harriet). Fred puts down his top hat to become sailor Bake Baker (yet another of his alliterative screen names), while Ginger plays old flame Sherry Martin. The two are reunited when Fred takes shore leave in San Francisco, and soon their efforts turn to helping Ginger's sister Connie (Hilliard) land Fred's shipmate Bilge (Scott). (Look for Lucille Ball and Betty Grable in small roles.) Too much screen time is spent on Hilliard and Scott, but Fred and Ginger make up for it with plenty of laughs and some classic musical numbers, and Irving Berlin's score is one of the best of the series, with cunning lyrics and melodies that linger in the memory. Highlights include Fred and Ginger in a dance contest, a Ginger solo tap number, and "I'm Putting All My Eggs in One Basket," their best comic dance. The pièce de résistance is "Let's Face the Music and Dance," a show within a show in which Fred and Ginger don their customary evening formals. Effortlessly flowing from pantomime to song to dance, this sublime piece of storytelling is one of Fred and Ginger's defining moments. --David Horiuchi
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