Cinema Tuesdays {Anchors Aweigh}

In their first buddy picture, Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra play sailors on a four day leave in Hollywood and both fall for Kathryn Grayson and her adorable nephew Dean Stockwell. They then pretend that they got her an audition with José Iturbi and spend the rest of their leave trying to meet Iturbi while fighting over "Aunt Susie". But everything turns out right in the end and they all live happily ever after and no one mentions the war.

I had forgotten how long Anchors Aweigh actually was. It's almost two and a half hours, which is epic for the traditional boy meets girl musical. However, there are sixteen numbers in the film, which is way more than just about every other musical. I think that MGM couldn't decide which star they could turn this into a vehicle for, so they gave Sinatra, Gene Kelly, Miss Grayson and Iturbi several numbers each. However, Sinatra got top billing, which isn't bad for his second role. Plus, MGM saved money by reusing sets and filming it entirely on location on the MGM studios. But the film does have some rare footage of the MGM studio building in colour and a location shoot at the Hollywood Bowl.

Anyway, lots of lovely costumes and colours and some morale boosting numbers to take your mind off the war for 2 and a half hours.

Also, I now want a sailor suit. Or at least the pants.

I love this dress! I think the sun flowers are painted on, can anyone tell for sure?

I want the chairs from the restaurant

And that lamp shade

His first experiment with mixing animation and dancing

Too bad they didn't have Betty Garrett playing this character like she did in the other two buddy films.