Weekly Revisit - Singin' in the Rain (1952) Yup, old is gold!

Film – Singin’ in the Rain

Duration – 1h 43m

Director – Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen

Cast - Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds, Donald O’Connor, Jean Haegen

Rating – 4 / 5

Almost 7 decades ago, Gene Kelly brought to the world one of the best feel good musicals of all time in the form of Singin’ in the Rain. It is a movie which never feels old and is loved by critics and audiences alike, no matter the time period they were born in. One of the reasons why this movie doesn’t feel old is because it is an old movie about old movies and how things have to change after a particular point of time. 

The main focus of the film is on how Kelly’s Don Lockwood, Jean Haegen’s Lina Lamont and O’ Connor’s Cosmo Brown have to adopt a totally different kind of skill set to survive in this new world of ‘talking pictures’. While Lockwood and Brown easily gel with this new trend given their immense talent, Lina faces a lot of difficulties as she lacks the ability to sing or dance skilfully and doesn’t have that sweet voice that audience desire. 

On the other hand Debbie Reynolds’ Kathy is a multi-talented stage actress who is a brilliant singer and dancer and is totally the go to girl for the new cinematic revolution. The plot revolves around how these characters bond with each other and how many changes this new revolution brings in each of their lives.

  

Silent Pictures

Talking Pictures

The melodious songs of the movie are something which viewers can’t get out of their minds with the title track i.e. Singing in the Rain, Good Morning and Make ‘Em Laugh being the absolute winners. The music of the movie is so compelling that one can’t help but humming it and dancing to its beats but so is the dance. 

The tap dance is performed so skilfully by Kelly and O’ Connor throughout the movie especially during the song, Moses Supposes that the audience can’t help but gasp in astonishment. Much of the credit for making all the songs so visually stunning goes to the lead cast especially to Donald O’Connor for doing almost everything from singing and dancing to gymnastics to Make ‘Em Laugh!

Mosses Supposes Tap Dance

Make 'em Laugh

                                       

What makes this film even more beautiful and delightful is the use of a whole variety of different colours throughout the film which can specially be noticed in the entire Broadway Melody sequence. Also, the Broadway Melody sequence was full of brilliant camera work, beautiful production designs and flawless editing and was the highest point of the entire movie technically as well as cinematically.

Apart from all the singing and dancing, the script of the film was both funny and meaningful as when required and the story wrapped up pretty satisfyingly for the audience as each character arc was closed appropriately with everything turning out to be the way it is supposed to be by the end. To sum up it is a movie that, just like Kelly, will make audiences forget their worries, drop their umbrellas and splash around while singing in the rain.