Carefree **** (1938, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Ralph Bellamy, Luella Gear, Clarence Kolb, Jack Carson, Franklin Pangborn) – Classic Movie Review 2953

Director Mark Sandrich’s 1938 romantic comedy musical movie is Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers’s eighth film together and, though there is a lot of fun to be found here, sadly the high standard is now beginning to show signs of slightly tailing off.

Astaire plays a psychiatrist called Dr Tony Flagg whose best buddy Stephen Arden (Ralph Bellamy) is having problems in his relationship with his fiancée, Amanda Cooper (Rogers). So Stephen persuades Dr Tony to find a cure for Amanda and persuades Amanda to visit Dr Tony. But soon the lovesick Amanda finds she’s in love with Tony and cannot tell the hapless Stephen.

This time the main accent is on screwball comedy instead of on song and dance, as sincere Fred finds that love is the cure for daffy Ginger. This has the fewest musical sequences of their ten films – only four. Astaire is an undiluted delight, but Rogers suffers from a shortage of funny lines and there are some unfunny turns from some of the supporting comedians.

Still it’s a joy to see the stars dance The Yam, watch Astaire in the swing with the golf club bagpipe number, hear Irving Berlin’s ‘Change Partners’ and be entertained by the surreal dream dance ‘I Used to Be Colour Blind’. This sequence was originally filmed in Technicolor but it was dropped because the quality was poor and the RKO studio decided the cost was going to be too high to get the technical specs right.

Nevertheless, Astaire refused to sing Berlin’s song The Yam because he thought it was silly, so Rogers gets a rare chance to sing it alone with Astaire joined in the dance afterwards.

Van Nest Polglase’s art direction (especially for the big set of the wood and stone country club) and the costume design (especially for Rogers’s hearts and arrows outfit with big black hat) both provide stylish pleasures.

Also in the cast are Luella Gear, Clarence Kolb, Jack Carson, Franklin Pangborn, Walter Kingsford and Hattie McDaniel.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2953

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