The Desert Song **** (1953, Gordon MacRae, Kathryn Grayson, Steve Cochran, Raymond Massey) – Classic Movie Review 5739

Director Bruce Humberstone skillfully revives the antique show for his enjoyable 1953 musical adventure The Desert Song, with ideal stars in Gordon MacRae, Kathryn Grayson, Steve Cochran and Raymond Massey.

This third film of Sigmund Romberg’s 1926 operetta (play by Otto Harbach, Laurence Schwab and Oscar Hammerstein II) takes place in North Africa where MacRae has a complicated double life as a mild-mannered anthropologist called Paul Bonnard, who falls for general’s daughter Margot Birabeau (Grayson), but she only has eyes for his doppelganger El Khobar (also MacRae), the daring leader of the Riffs. Little does Margot know they are the same bloke!

There are appealing performances with attractive singing from the two stars, and Massey makes a tasty turbaned villain as Sheik Yousseff, with Ray Collins useful as General Birabeau, as well as Steve Cochran as Captain Claude Fontaine, Dick Wesson as Benjy Kidd, Allyn Ann McLerie as Azuri and Paul Picerni as Hassan.

It is a lavish production, shot in lovely Technicolor by Robert Burks, and capably staged by director Humberstone. Max Steiner adapted the music, using the full score.

Of course it is all rather daft and camp, but it is very enjoyable because it is being taken so seriously.

The hit songs include ‘The Riff Song’ (sung by Gordon MacRae and Men’s Chorus ) ‘One Alone’ (sung by Gordon MacRae), ‘Long Live the Night’ (sung by Kathryn Grayson), ‘Romance’ (sung by Kathryn Grayson), and ‘The Desert Song’ (sung by Gordon MacRae and Kathryn Grayson).

Most of ‘The Riff Song’ lyrics are rewritten by uncredited writers, common practice in Broadway musical adaptations before 1955. Studios did this so royalties from sales of sheet music for the film versions would go to them not to the original lyricists.

Also in the cast are William Conrad, Trevor Bardette, Frank DeKova, Mark Dana, Maurice Marsac, Peter Brocco, Rico Alaniz, Ben Astar, George Blagoi, Larry Chance, and John Bose.

The Desert Song runs 110 minutes, is made and released by Warner Bros, is written by Roland Kibbee (screenplay), produced by Rudi Fehr and designed by Stanley Fleischer.

Warner Bros filmed it twice before: in 1929 as The Desert Song with John Boles as the Red Shadow (aka Pierre Birbeau) and in 1943 as The Desert Song, when Nazis were the villains.

Kathryn Grayson (1922–2010) sings Jerome Kern’s ‘Smoke Gets in Your Eyes’ in Lovely to Look At (1952). It is heart-stopping.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5739

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