Top Hat
Director: Mark Sandrich
Year Released: 1935
Rating: 2.5
Tip-tapping Jerry (Fred Astaire) falls in love with Dale (Ginger Rogers), but she rejects his advances because she thinks he's a married producer (Edward Everett Horton) - this inexplicable confusion continues throughout, and oh yes, there are some dance numbers scattered sparingly. The problem with many of these 'musicals' is that the core story isn't strong enough to carry it along - the dance bits are wonderful, of course ("Cheek to Cheek" in particular), but the misunderstood identity crisis is perpetuated so long you wonder how and why anyone would be realistically baffled for so long. As much as it pains me to say, neither Astaire nor Rogers were exactly 'actors' in the strictest sense - they were song-and-dance vets, and Hermes Pan's choreography is delightful.
