Written as part of the blogathon hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves. Join in the blogging fun by picking three movies that fit the week's theme and writing a bit about them!
As you know, I LOVE musicals. But this week isn't about that. This week for Thursday Movie Picks, we are talking about non-musicals that nonetheless have a scene (or two) where characters break into song. Such scenes can certainly liven up the proceedings, being that these scenes tend to do the same things that musical numbers in musicals do, giving us an insight into these characters that we wouldn't otherwise get if they didn't have the musical outlet.
Key Largo (John Huston, 1948) One of the greatest ensemble casts ever assembled (Lauren Bacall, Lionel Barrymore, Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, Claire Trevor) get stuck in a hotel lobby during a hurricane on the titular island. Bogart is there to pay his respects to a WWII comrade's widow (Bacall, naturally), but before long, Robinson and his thugs get into a bit of a situation with some local on-the-run criminals and take control of the hotel. The scene in question is a stunner, as Trevor's Gaye Dawn is manipulated by her lover (Robinson, naturally) to perform one of her cabaret numbers for the group. It's a stunning scene, one that more than earned Trevor her Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. The movie itself is a great exercise in escalating tension, if one of the lesser Bogart/Bacall pairings.
Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1999) PTA's kaleidoscopic look at the lives of all kinds of people in the San Fernando Valley does the "interconnecting stories" thing much better than most other films (including the similar, ham-fisted Oscar winner Crash), and is absolutely mesmerizing in its best moments. The very best of which is the sequence when nearly all of the film's characters (and there are a LOT of them) start separately singing Aimee Mann's beautiful "Wise Up" as the song plays on the soundtrack. It's a stunning moment, which makes it all the sadder that Anderson had to go and gild the lily with the movie's ridiculous ending, which looks for all the world like he wrote himself into a corner, chose the most ridiculous deus ex machina he could think of, and added the movie's opening sequence to justify it. But that's just me, and I really do love the rest of Magnolia something fierce - the performances alone are worth the price of admission (Tom Cruise deserved the Oscar for his balls-to-the-wall performance as professional male chauvinist Frank T.J. Mackey), and even though it's long, it's consistently involving. It's just a pity about that ending.
The Shape of Water (Guillermo del Toro, 2017) I don't want to spoil it, because it came to me as an utter surprise in the movie, and it's maybe my favorite scene in any movie of 2017. Using the old standard "You'll Never Know" was a stroke of genius, and del Toro manages to turn it into the most magical moment in a movie full to bursting with movie magic. Elisa is a mute cleaning woman at a secret government facility in 1960s Baltimore. When an amphibious humanoid "asset" is brought to the facility, Elisa finds it a kindred spirit, and when she learns it is going to be killed, she takes it upon herself (and her gay artist neighbor) to rescue it. A gorgeous piece of work on every level, The Shape of Water was nominated for more Oscars than any other movie this year, and I'm pulling for it to win most of them, and wouldn't be upset if it pulled off a sweep.
Lists are, if you'll pardon my French, fucking DIFFICULT. I hate
making them with a flaming passion. But I also LOVE them. They feel so
representative, so orderly, so... SATISFYING. But compiling them?
They're hard enough to order as it is outside of a few selections near
the top usually, but then just when you think you're done you realize
you completely forgot something and it screws up everything, or you
realize that one thing dominates more than half the list, or you can't
find a crucial piece of info or even proof of the existence of one of
your entries, causing you to question your sanity... NIGHTMARE.
But sometimes, you just feel the need and come hell or high water or no sleep, you HAVE to make a list. And so here we are.
Because
of that one episode of Hit Me With Your Best Shot a few weeks back,
music videos have been on my mind recently. Mainly in an "Are they still
a thing?" way, but I felt a list coming on, so I decided not to fight
it... only there were entirely too many videos to choose from when
making a list of the greatest of them all. But then I went back to my
roots and decided to do a list of the Best DANCE Videos, and everything
fell into place. Kind of.
Granted, you could make a
list that consisted entirely of Michael and Janet Jackson videos and it
would arguably hold water, so dominant are they at creating
dance-centric clips... but a list of dance videos without Madonna?
Without Paula Abdul? Inconceivable!
But on the other
hand, there are AT LEAST six Janet videos that could be considered
definitive for her, compared to one for pretty much everybody else, and
they all pretty much trounce the competition. Leave it to Janet to
always bring the next level shit - the tilting dance floor in "Doesn't
Really Matter", the mixture of Afro-Cuban dance, breakdance, and
stepping in "Escapade" - and also to show the young-uns how it's done
("All For You" and "All Nite" are some of the most intricate, stylish
dance videos of their respective eras). I mean, yes, "Rhythm Nation" is
her best overall video, but can you really put it on a dance-centric
list above the incredible solo in "Pleasure Principle" or the killer
chair routine in "Miss You Much"?
Anyway, this has been
on my brain for long enough. So I finally decided to throw caution to
the wind and just publish the damn thing already.
I had
only one criteria for this list: The dancing has to be the star. So any
clips in which dance plays a supporting role ("Chasing Pavements") or in
which the dance routine just doesn't get enough screen time ("Marry The
Night" and pretty much anything else by Lady Gaga) had to go,
unfortunately. Videos that were one-take wonders got extra consideration
due to degree of difficulty. I decided to cap it at 40 because Top 40 is a big deal in music. If there's enough interest or if I feel like it, I'll post ten Honorable Mentions to bring it up to 50. I'll be posting 10 a day until it's done.
