Synopsis: Jerry Mulligan, a struggling American painter in Paris, is “discovered” by an influential heiress with an interest in more than Jerry’s art. Jerry in turn falls for Lise, a young French girl already engaged to a cabaret singer. Jerry jokes, sings and dances with his best friend, an acerbic would-be concert pianist, while romantic complications abound.
Cast
Gene Kelly……………………………………….Jerry Mulligan
Leslie Caron………………………………………..Lise Bouvier
Oscar Levant………………………………………..Adam Cook
Georges Guetary………………………………….Henri Baurel
Nina Foch…………………………………………..Milo Roberts
Review: This Vincente Minnelli directed, Gene Kelly/Stanley Donan choreographed MGM musical is a moving, ground breaking, love poem to artistry and romance. First off the clarity and color of the Blu-Ray disc is astonishingly clear. The restoration and high definition picture draws you in and you start to notice details such as the paint on the Parisian walls etc. in crisp detail.
This film won the Academy Award for Best Picture after it’s release in 1951. The winning score by George and Ira Gershwin sweeps you away with songs like, S Wonderful, Our Love is Here to Stay and I’ve Got Rhythm. There is something undeniably sublime in watching everyman dancer Gene Kelly, painter Jerry Mulligan, at work here. His roots as a dance instructor in his family’s dance school is in evidence as he works with the children in the I Got Rhythm number. He is delightful and enchanting and the children follow him in grand amusement in hopes of getting some American Bubble Gum.
Leslie Caron a dancer who was trained in Ballet makes her film debut here and it is her charisma and dance craft that carries her through the film. She almost floats as she dances with Kelly in Our Love is Here To Stay. Her charm and warmth appeals every time she smiles.
Oscar Levant is hilarious as struggling self-proclaimed concert pianist Adam Cook. He describes himself in the opening sequence of the film: “It’s not a pretty face, I grant you. But underneath its flabby exterior is an enormous lack of character.”
Georges Guetary plays singer Henri Baurel, who is engaged to Lise, he is unaware that his friend Jerry Mulligan is in love with her. Guetary’s big number Stairway to Paradise, showcases his singing talents amidst a large lighted staircase and a bevy of beautiful MGM girls. The song is done with artistry and never crosses the line into gaudiness.
Nina Foch plays suntan oil heiress Milo Roberts. She falls for Mulligan and wants to promote his paintings in a legitimate art show. Mulligan at first balks because he doesn’t want Robert’s affections. The relationship never really gets off the ground because Mulligan is truly in love with Caron’s character Lise.
The most celebrated sequence in the film is Kelly’s choreographed 17 minute ballet. The uniqueness of taking famous french artist’s paintings and bringing them to life with Paris as the background, is contemporaryand brilliant. The ballet tells the story of Mulligan’s love for Lise. Kelly smoothly transitions from ballet, tap and jazz dance throughout the 17 minutes. One gets caught up in the sequence’s use of color, music and dance.
The disc includes a few extras such as the PBS produced American Masters Episode: Gene Kelly Anatomy of a Dancer a vintage MGM Fitzpatrick TravelTalk short, Paris on Parade and a classic MGM cartoon Symphony in Slang. Overall this is a must have film for anyone’s cinema collection.
Recommended: 
ARGO
26 OctSynopsis: A dramatization of the 1980 joint CIA-Canadian secret operation to extract six fugitive American diplomatic personnel out of revolutionary Iran. The film also satirizes the Hollywood film community and what it took for the CIA to get their help in the operation.
CAST
Ben Affleck…………………………………Tony Mendez (CIA Operative)
Bryan Cranston……………………………………………….Jack O’Donnell
Alan Arkin………………………………………………………..Lester Siegel
John Goodman……………………….John Chambers (make-up artist)
Clea DuVall…………………………………………………………..Cora Lijek
Kyle Chandler……………………………………………..Hamilton Jordan
Victor Garber……………………………………………Kenneth D. Taylor
Tate Donovan……………………………………………………Bob Anders
Michael Parks…….Jack Kirby (Comic Book/Story Board Artist)
Tom Lenk………………………………………………………………….Rodd
Christopher Stanley……………………………………………Tom Ahern
Taylor Schilling…………………………………………Christine Mendez
Ashley Wood…………………………………………………………..Beauty
Sheila Vand……………………………………………………………..Sahar
Chris Messina………………………………………………………..Malinov
Richard Kind………………………………………………………Max Klein
Titus Welliver………………………………………………………Jon Bates
Rory Cochrane…………………………………………………..Lee Schatz
Devansh Mehta………………………………………………Matt Sanders
Omid Abtahi……………………………………………………………..Reza
Scoot McNairy………………………………………………..Joe Stafford
Kerry Bishé…………………………………………………Kathy Stafford
Christopher Denham………………………………………….Mark Lijek
Karina Logue………………………………………..Elizabeth Ann Swift
Bob Gunton……..Cyrus Vance (United States Secretary of State)
Philip Baker Hall………………Warren Christopher (Deputy S.O.S.)
Adrienne Barbeau………………………………………………………Nina
Fouad Hajji…………………………………………………………..Komiteh
President Jimmy Carter…………Himself (uncredited voice-over)
Review: The film directed by its’ star, Ben Affleck, is based on the true events that occurred during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Jimmy Carter was President when the American Embassy in Iran was seized during the Iranian Revolution by militants, taking sixty hostages as six American Ambassadors, barely made it out. The six Ambassadors took refuge in the Canadian Embassy and were stuck there hoping they wouldn’t get caught. The Ayatollah Khomeini, who was the leader of the Iranian people at the time, had blamed the ill’s of the country on American intervention.
Victor Garber plays Ken Taylor, the head of the Canadian Embassy in Tehran, and knowingly puts himself and his family at risk by taking in the Ambassadors before they are found out. The CIA works feverishly to intervene and even brings in Tony Mendez (Affleck), their chief operative in charge of hostage extraction to figure out how to get the six out.
Mendez calls on his friend the make-up artist for the Planet of The Ape movies, John Chambers, who has helped the CIA with cover identities, to help here. Chambers is the one who comes up with the idea that Affleck would go in an as a Canadian film location scout. He also came up with the idea that the six hostages can have fake Canadian passports and pose as production crew and director. Goodman introduces Mendez to aging film producer Lester Siegel, (Arkin) who buys into the lie and uses the Hollywood machine to fake a fake movie production. The film they use is a science fiction script called ARGO and they even set-up a fake Hollywood production office with phone, movie posters and files. I might add the irony of all this is that it is paid for by the U.S. Government. Goodman and Arkin add a light-hearted and often hilarious touch to the art of Hollywood film makers and producers.
The film is a taut, edge of your seat drama, that recreates actual events as they happen. You have to ask yourself how taken by America’s Hollywood the Iranians are that they fell for the cover hook, line and sinker. The film is a winner by any standard and Affleck possibly directed the finest film of the year. It will be a disappointment if this film doesn’t pick-up a nomination for best-picture or best supporting actor for Arkin. Arkin is brilliant at sarcasm, when a collegue asks him what ARGO is about he growls, “ARGO f*&%$k yourself!” Which does become a wink and a nod between Mendez and his Hollywood friends.
Stay for the end credits because there are pictures of the Actors and the their real world counterparts shown side by side as President Jimmy Carter, in Voice-Over, discusses the actual ARGO operation and the facts surrounding the events.
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Tags: Alan Arkin, ARGO, Ben Affleck, brian Cranston, CIA, cinema, Cinema Review, commentary, entertainment, film, John Goodman, Kyle Chandler, Movies, reviews, Suspense, Thriller, True-Story, Victor Garber