Irving Berlin's "This is the Army" (1943)

[HollywoodGolightly]

There was a thread about this movie finally getting an official release on DVD, but that thread has been inactive for more than a year, and as per TCMWebAdmin, we're not allowed to post on those threads any more.

 

For reference:

http://forums.tcm.com/jive/tcm/thread.jspa?threadID=126565

 

Anyway, even though it's been nearly a year since this came out on an official DVD release, it's taken me all of this time to finally get around to renting This is the Army and I must say, just looking at the sleeve I was amazed to see how many bonus features this movie has.

 

Is there anyone here who has watched this on the WHV DVD - including the bonus features?

[HollywoodGolightly]

I watched this the other day. And, I'll tell ya, I was expecting it to be a bit old-fashioned. What I was not prepared for was another "blackface" number, especially when there is another number with real African-American soldiers, who by the way, are really great themselves.

 

But that's just a small quibble.. it's still a pretty good wartime propaganda-musical.

[NZ]

I'll agree with the previous comment and add that in terms of musical melange, this film is top flight Iriving Berlin, unabashedly patriotic and wearing its heart proudly on its sleeve. Kate Smith belts out God Bless America as no one since has been able to.

 

I Left My Heart At The Stage Door Canteen left a lump in my throat and the finale is truly rousing. The extra features are nice, but I wish WB had done more work on the actual print of the film. While color fidelity is far superior to anything that used to pass in Public Domain copies of this film, there's still a lot of age related dirt and scratches in the print itself and a few minor moments of Technicolor misregistration to contend with.

 

Otherwise, if you don't already own this one - you should. It comes as part of a 3 pack with Hollywood Canteen (another rousingly patriotic flag waver in the best sense) and Thank Your Lucky Stars (a rather painful excursion with some nevertheless fun musical offerings peppered throughout.)

 

RE: blackface - it was an acceptable part of mass entertainment right up until the mid-point of the last 100 years. To deny that it ever existed is silly. To embrace it is preposterous. To acknowledge it as a part of American entertainment culture seems accurate enough. Enough said.

[DownGoesFrazier]

Was "blackface" still being used as late as 1950? Examples?

[HollywoodGolightly]

> {quote:title=NZ wrote:}{quote}

> Otherwise, if you don't already own this one - you should. It comes as part of a 3 pack with Hollywood Canteen (another rousingly patriotic flag waver in the best sense) and Thank Your Lucky Stars (a rather painful excursion with some nevertheless fun musical offerings peppered throughout.)

 

As a matter of fact, I ordered the set recently - found it for just $20 at DD. Hopefully I'll get the set before Christmas.

[DougieB]

Joan Crawford in the "Two-Faced Woman" number in "Torch Song".

[NZ]

Oh...Crawford in blackface in that film. Even at the ripe old age of 39 that image still makes me cringe! Talk about bad taste.