Starring Bessie Love, Anita Page and Charles King
Produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer (MGM)
Eddie is an up-and-coming song-and-dance man whose latest song, The Broadway Melody, has singers lining up to "put it over." Eddie knows he has a hit, but he's saving it for a sister act moving to New York from the west. Why? Because one of them is the soon-to-be Mrs. Eddie Kearns.
Eddie's fiancée Hank has the brains and moxie of the duo while her sister Queenie has the looks. Eddie gets them in for an audition in Mr. Zanfield's latest review, but between a smart aleck dancer and a malfunctioning piano, their number does not go well. Despite that, Zanfield agrees to bring them into the act.
When the dress rehearsal comes, Zanfield decides the show is moving too slowly and cuts the Mahoney Sisters. Queenie finds herself replacing an injured chorus girl while Hank can only watch from the sidelines.
To complicate matters, Jock Warriner, a wealthy theater patron has taken a shine to Queenie and Eddie himself is falling in love with the more attractive sister.
Will Hank come to terms with her sister's burgeoning stardom? And will Queenie choose Jock or Eddie?
In 1930, The Broadway Melody won the Best Picture Oscar. The award represented a couple of milestones. First, it was the first sound film to win the Academy Award.
And apparently, it is also the worst film to be honored as well.
At some level, I get it. Sound is new and people were flocking to the theater to hear their films for the first time. The Broadway Melody was capitalizing on a trend.
But this is a really bad movie.
The film gives us four main characters, but no reason to cheer for any of them. He brings Hank to New York to marry her, but immediately falls for Queenie on looks alone. Hank is surly and rude for the entire first half of the film, stiffing a bell hop and accosting theater owners with a sense of entitlement. Queenie is vapid, quick to capitalize on her looks and seemingly more interested in diamonds than her sister.
By default, Jock is the one I most liked. And he is supposed to be the villain of the piece. We are told repeatedly that he is a skirt chaser who will lose interest in Queenie the moment a new model comes around. We never see that. In fact, he seems pretty devoted. He makes a turn toward the end to solidify his spot as the bad guy, but for most of the movie it's not apparent why we are rooting against him.
All that would be a high hurdle for any film to overcome. The Broadway Melody however couples its loathsome characters with terrible acting. I mean high school freshman level. A character leaves a room, then stops because he is waiting for someone to call him back. There are random, multiple awkward hugs, uncomfortable stares and emotionless line readings.
For a musical, even the singing and dancing is unremarkable. There are no memorable songs and the dancing lacks any energy or even coordination at points.
For directors, usually I am paying attention to shot selection and framing, editing and how well they work with the actors. I apparently also have to worry about whether they and their crew can keep a shot in focus.
There are exactly two things I enjoyed here. First, there were some nice helicopter shots establishing New York City. Second, Eddie Kane as Zanfield was great. It's a character who surrounds himself with yes-men and always gets his way. Kane delivers his lines stone-faced and in a deadpan tone that brought some humor.
If it sounds like I am reaching for things to like, you are definitely on the right track. A cliched scenario, characters you hate, actors who can't act and dancing that grates. The Broadway Melody is almost so bad it's good.
Almost.
* out of *****
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