Thank you Mr. Currier and thank you Mr. Ives

THE BELLE OF NEW YORK

1952

Directed by Charles Walters

Written by Chester Erskine, Robert O'Brien, and Irving Elinson (based on the play by Hugh Morton)

Spoiler alert: moderate

The grim divorcee

EVERYTHING I HAVE IS YOURS

1952

Directed by Robert Z. Leonard

Written by George Wells and Ruth Brooks Flippen

Spoiler alert: I'd say moderate, some might say high

All I ask is just one more chance—just one more dance?

LOVELY TO LOOK AT

1952

Directed by Mervyn LeRoy and Vincente Minelli

Written by George Wells and Harry Ruby (based on the musical play Roberta by Jerome Kern and Otto Harbach based on the novel Gowns by Roberta by Alice Deur Miller)

Spoiler alert: moderate

Cineramarama: Beautiful for spacious skies

THIS IS CINERAMA

1952

Directed by Merian C. Cooper, Michael Todd Jr., Ernest B. Schoedsack, and Gunther von Frisch

Spoiler alert: as inapplicable as it gets

If I had the chance, I'd ask the world to dance

INVITATION TO THE DANCE

If every musical of the 1950s winds up turning into a pretentious art film for ten or twenty minutes, what would happen if a musical was simply conceived as a pretentious art film from the start?  That's the experiment Gene Kelly ran when he made Invitation to the Dance, and the results, while mixed, suggest that Kelly's opus deserves a higher profile amongst its brethren musicals than the near-obscurity which, sadly, it actually enjoys.

1952/1956

Directed by, choreographed by, and starring Gene Kelly

Spoiler alert: moderate

Masaki Kobayashi, part I: Groovin' all week with you

Masaki Kobayashi may not be the first or even the fifth name you think of when you think of Japanese cinema.  This series of reviews is dedicated to why this is wrong.

MY SONS' YOUTH
(Musuko no seishun)

Boys will be boys, and dads will be dads, even in post-war Japan.

1952
Directed by Masaki Kobayashi
Written by Fusao Hayashi and Sadayo Nakamura
With Ryuji Kita (Dad), Kuniko Miyake (Mom), Akira Ishihama (Haruhiko), and Motoji Fujiwara (Akuhiko)

Spoiler alert: severe