Pal Joey
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Movie Reviews of Pal Joey
Movie Review: Dated but still a blast
Summary: 4 Stars
The recent Broadway revival of Pal Joey is a stark contrast to the film version which drastically overhauled the story and song list, mostly for the better. Frank Sinatra plays Joey as a cad with a heart of gold, who you know will do the right thing in the end. Getting to that point, you have to put up with Frank's 1950-ish hipster persona, which by todays standards produces quite a few cringes in his attitude towards women. Getting past that, the movie has widely added several great Rodgers and Hart songs from their other musicals, including one of Frank's signature numbers, "The Lady is a Tramp." The music alone makes it worthwhile to watch.
The location has been moved to San Francisco, and the location footage is another pleasant change from the play's dreary Chicago setting. The characters have also been altered, becoming less caustic on the one side, as with Joey, and even sweeter on the other side, as with Kim Novak. Having seen the Broadway version, and concluding that the greatest fault of the show was the inability to like the main characters, the changes here work for the best.
I don't know if Rita Hayworth and Kim Novak did their own singing, but since most of the songs are performed by the incomparable Sinatra, you are sure to be humming several of the tunes for days afterwards.
Movie Review: Wowweewowwow!
Summary: 4 Stars
Despite its Broadway success, Pal Joey took his time reaching thescreen. Gene Kelly came to fame in the title role in the original Broadway production of Pal Joey and was the logical first choice for the screen version but when MGM would not lend him out the project sat on the backburner so long that his intended co-star Rita Hayworth swapped female roles to play the older woman who bankrolls Joey's club - on her terms - by the time the film finally reached the screen in 1957.
One of the few Columbia musicals that creates some of its own magic rather than trying to copy the RKO and MGM formula, Sinatra is so perfect as John O'Hara's heel that it is now impossible to imagine Kelly in the role. Not all of the Rodgers and Hart's songs are well served - some, such as I Didn't Know What Time It Was, are all but thrown away - but the score is a strong one (The Lady Is A Tramp, Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered, If They Asked Me I Could Write A Book ) and the film is one of the few successful Broadway-to-screen transfers of its day. Great dog too.
The only real extra is the original five-minute trailer, but it's a gem. Filmed on the film's set, with Sinatra introducing us to Joey's vocabulary with the aid of a blackboard and ruler, it's terrific fun and a genuine collector's item!
Movie Review: Pal Joey- final cut
Summary: 4 Stars
The 1957 film version of "Pal Joey" as featured on DVD is a gorgeous thing to behold, gorgeous women and scenery (San Francisco subbing for the Chicago of the play). On the down-side... too many superb songs from the play were reduced to mere dance or background music. George Sidney was a fine director for musicals, but we have to wonder what a more accomplished auteur might have done with the material. Billy Wilder almost made the film, but didn't want to use Rita Hayworth because at 39 she wasn't really old enough to play "older woman" to gigolo Frank Sinatra. However, Rita while still stunning, had endured a hard life. She looked @50 and Wilder should have thought twice about it. The film is 'zingy' and fun, but the play needs a more faithful remake, perhaps by Rob Marshall. Sadly, it doesn't appear that any of these great "cut songs" by Rodgers 'n Hart were actually shot. However, the dream number 'What Do I Care for a Dame?' was filmed in a much longer version (info. per the late Dorothy Kingsley). This footage exists somewhere in Columbia's vaults, and should have been included as an 'extra' on the DVD. Thanx, H
Movie Review: Sinatra Sinatra
Summary: 4 Stars
Sinatra at his hipster best. Kim Novak is stunning, Rita dos her dance provacatuer..and the songs are terrific.Chez Joey is the nightclub that Rita will bankroll only if Joey is " in line" Look for Barbara Nichols in the chorus line.
Just when you might think the plot drags a bit here comes another Sinatra standard..and oh that 1957 Thunderbird.!
Movie Review: Classic Rodgers-Hart Songs Provide Framework for a Swinging Sinatra in a Predictably Drawn Triangle
Summary: 3 Stars
If Frank Sinatra had a signature role in his long movie career, this must be it because he plays one of his coolest cats in this fairly adult 1957 musical drama based on a book by John O'Hara. However, it's better remembered for the fourteen songs by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, many of which became Sinatra standards. Written by Dorothy Kingsley, the rather slight story has the crooner play womanizing nightclub singer Joey Evans who keeps losing jobs because cad that he is, he likes to fool around with married women. Joey lands in San Francisco and finagles his way into a job as singer and emcee at a dive called the Barbary Coast. There he meets innocent Linda English from Albuquerque, a chorine who refuses to strip and just wants to be a torch singer. In typical Sinatra swinging fashion, Joey flirts with her but plays hard-to-get. One night, both are recruited for a charity show held at a posh Nob Hill mansion. The hostess is Vera Simpson, a former striptease performer who has since become a wealthy society matron. Sparks fly between Joey and Vera but only after mutual acts of humiliation. He breezily moves in with her on her yacht, and she decides to fund his pipe dream, owning a sophisticated nightspot she dubs "Chez Joey". Never one to leave his cards on the table, Joey hires Linda to sing, and you can guess the rest as the inevitable romantic triangle takes the expected turns.
Directed by George Sidney (Anchors Aweigh, Viva Las Vegas), it plays out rather lugubriously with nary a surprise, but the songs are mostly gems. Sinatra knows how to play heels, though Joey never gets hard-boiled enough to develop a true edge. On the upside, he sings "There's a Small Hotel", "I Could Write a Book" and best of all, "The Lady Is a Tramp" to a guardedly smitten Rita Hayworth well cast as Vera. Even though at 38, she was actually younger than Sinatra, she cuts a coolish (and shapely) figure as a jealous patroness despite the unflattering camera angles. It's just a shame that the story doesn't respect her character much, especially at the very end. However, when she literally lets her hair down, it's a relief to see her old seductive self in post-coital bliss as she lip-syncs "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered" (sung seductively by Jo Ann Greer). As Linda, Kim Novak - a year away from Vertigo - fares less well as she looks tentative and oddly blank-faced during her big number, "My Funny Valentine" (sung sonorously by Trudy Erwin). But we all know it's really Sinatra we want to see perform, and from that respect, a lot of the movie plays out like one of his 1960's TV specials. The only extras on the 1999 DVD are a couple of trailers and talent files for the principals. An intermittent entertainment, it's definitely a product of a bygone era.