CHARLES WALTERS
Bil’s rating (out of 5): BB.
USA, 1951. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Story by Dorothy Kingsley, George Wells, Screenplay by Dorothy Kingsley. Cinematography by Robert H. Planck. Produced by Jack Cummings. Music by David Rose. Production Design by William Ferrari, Cedric Gibbons. Costume Design by Helen Rose. Film Editing by Adrienne Fazan.
Minor Esther Williams film hardly gets her into the pool in its zippy 77 minute running time. She and Red Skelton play circus performers who are struggling to get by. After he makes friends with a drunken Texas millionaire (Keenan Wynn), Skelton takes Williams to a hotel that Wynn is staying at and, in the baron’s absence, is mistaken for the man he is looking for. Now, he is making friends under an assumed name and courting adorable Ann Miller while Williams is being romanced by Wynn’s right-hand man Howard Keel. The plot is a very simple distraction, and it’s a shame that there is only one underwater sequence (and a dream sequence at that!), but all the actors are game and perform the forgettable musical numbers with gusto. Miller’s “It’s Dynamite” number is the film’s only highlight.
