Dance, Girl, Dance (1940)

I watched this movie as a recommended viewing for a film class, so I did not realize that the Library of Congress chose this film to be preserved in the U.S. National Film Registry as a movie of "cultural, historical or aesthetic interest"--I am not sure, but I think it might have looked quite feminist for the time period it was made in.  The girls work, and they have minds of their own (which becomes abundantly clear in a speech made towards the end of the movie).  The director was a woman--Dorothy

Lucille Ball is spot on as Bubbles,  a show girl who has charisma on the stage, and hard to miss sex appeal.  This is the best Lucille Ball performance that I have seen.  She looks like she is having fun performing, and she is a knock out.  The story goes that Bubbles leaves the more or less respectable world of show girl dancing to become the main attraction in a burlesque show.  She had been living in a boarding house with a group of other show girls, which included Judy (Maureen O'Hara), a squeaky clean girl who has aspperations to be a ballerina, but has absoultely no formal training.  Judy loses her job, and Bubbles convinces her to dance ballet in the burlesque show--she is the unpopular goody two shoes that the audience boos until Bubbles comes back on. the movie has romance, and ends up with both Judy and Bubbles ending up with men they deserve.  Very nice period piece.