42nd Street (1933)

Yet another one of the old movies that we are watching as a family.  I have always read the books that my children have been assigned in school, and I continued that habit well into the college years--the only times that has been challenging have been with my English major son--the other two studied Biology and Engineering, and I was never in danger of being overwhelmed with reading.

Now that son number four is in school, and my other three sons have limited time in college, I am ready to throw myself fully into the college experience--after all, it has been quite some time since I was there myself, and I can undoubtedly learn quite a bit.

The education I have been receiving this semester in old movies has been fabulous.  This one is a musical set right in the midst of the Depression.  Warner Brothers was known for not glossing over the hardships that people were enduring.  They gave people hope, but they also depicted the lot of the average person as being beleaguered and challenging.

One of the reasons this may have been so popular with me is that while it is a musical, it is what is known as a 'backstage' musical--so most of what we see is the makings of a musical, rather than that the story is told in musical form (which I am less fond of)--there is some magnificent dancing shown (the overhead shots of this were well known to me even before I saw the movie), and the story is a familiar one:  Penny Sawyer (Ruth Keeber) is a young unknown dancer who feels lucky to be working at all.  She is in the chorus of a musical with a big name talent (Bebe Daniels), but when the star takes a tumble and cannot go on, Penny gets her big chance.  It is not complicated and it gets its message across in a very entertaining way.  One notable thing is that while this is filmed during the Depression and people are actually not getting enough food, the dancers are not super skinny and anorexic looking--they look like real women look.  Refreshing that we used to find that attractive.