Week 9 (Part 3): Three Musicals

It's beginning to dawn on me just how long this project will take to complete. I'm currently averaging about five movies per week. With roughly 360 movies to go, that means I am looking at over two more years of film watching.

The TCM channel has made things easier this month. They are airing almost non-stop blocks of Oscar-nominated films (not just "Best Picture" nominees, though) for the entire month of February. I've recorded about 25 movies already, and more are coming. That frees up a lot of space on the snail-mail Netflix queue.

Anyway, let's talk about three musicals:

• Funny Girl (Nominated 1968)
• Fiddler on the Roof (Nominated 1971)
• Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (Nominated 1954)

Funny Girl is the film that put Barbara Streisand on the map. She's a real tour de force in this one. It takes place in the Florenz Ziegfield era of Broadway (just prior to World War I). Streisand reprises her Broadway role as Fanny Brice, and she deservedly won the Oscar in 1968 for Best Actress. Unfortunately, aside from Streisand, the movie is just okay. The songs are just okay, the supporting cast is just okay. Omar Sharif is great as Nicky Arnstein, a professional gambler and Fanny's love interest, and I do think there was good chemistry between Sharif and Streisand. However, he can't sing all that well, and his character is written very oddly. The second half of the movie is very strangely melodramatic, and I don't understand the ending (which involves Arnstein turning himself in for a vaguely/not explained history of criminal embezzlement?) at all. 

Omar gettin' fresh with Barb

(Interesting tidbit about Sharif: in addition to playing a professional card player in Funny Girl, he is apparently a great one in real life. He was once one of the world's top-ranked bridge players.)

This is worth watching, but ultimately not even Streisand and my boy Omar could turn it into a truly great film. The 1968 winner was another musical, Oliver!, that I have yet to see. Score: 6.2.

Fiddler on the Roof is a movie with less Hollywood sheen but much better songs. The cast is not high-powered, but it is authentic, starring Topol--of Israeli film and theater fame--in the lead role of the father Tevye. The movie is about a family in a Jewish shtetl of the Russian Empire in the early 20th century, and Tevye's struggles to balance tradition (TRADITION!) with the changing modern attitudes as his daughters approach marrying age. In the shtetl, the Jews live alongside Russian Cossacks. All are leery of one another, and they dance differently, as shown in one of my favorite scenes of the film (and, actually, one of my now-favorite dance numbers in any movie):

This is a good movie, but I think I'd rather see it on stage. John Williams conducts the score, which makes it feel like Star Wars at times, and that is strange. Fiddler on the Roof is nowhere near as good as The French Connection, which won Best Picture in 1971, and so, thus far, 1971 is a year that got it right. Score: 7.0.

Finally, let's take a trip over to Oregon and talk about Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. And I don't mean Portlandia Oregon, I mean "Oregon Trail" Oregon. This is the best of these three musicals, and I actually got to see it in the theater (thanks Alamo Drafthouse a.k.a. best place in the universe). The plot is hilariously simple: seven brothers, the Pontipees, move to Oregon to farm and harvest lumber, and they are all single. In the opening scene, the oldest brother finds a wife, Milly, and brings her home to the ranch, where the other six Pontipee brothers are running amok. Their names are all biblical, A through G, in order of birth. Since there is no male "F" name in the bible, the second-youngest brother is named Frank, which is short for Frankincense. Hysterical! The brothers also wear color-coded shirts throughout the film! This basically preempts the entire premise of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers!

Milly works to civilize them so that they, too, might one day find brides. Later, everyone goes to a barn raising, and the six younger Pontipees compete against random, non-lumberjack townsfolk for the affections of the other girls. It's one of the best dance scenes in any movie:

Later, the Pontipee brothers literally capture the townswomen and take them back to their ranch for the winter. The women slowly fall in love with the six brothers. It's funny, but also eerily toes the line of depicting Stockholm Syndrome. Since it's a musical comedy, I will give it the benefit of the doubt. Overall, the songs and performances are fantastic, and the film is surprisingly funny. 

One bonus for me was seeing a young Russ Tamblyn as Gideon / youngest brother / blue-shirt. He's even younger here than in his later, more famous role in West Side Story. He's a phenomenal dancer and physical actor. Had I not started this project, I might never have appreciated Tamblyn's illustrious, pre-Twin Peaks (Dr. Jacoby) career. 

The 1954 Best Picture winner was On The Waterfront, which I am excited to see, but Seven Brides for Seven Brothers has aged well and is a seldom-discussed classic. Score: 8.6.