Cover Girl

Rusty, dancing at a small nightclub in Brooklyn, wins a magazine contest, becomes a cover girl and moves to Broadway. Danny, her boyfriend who runs the club, reads it as loss. Charles Vidor made it with Rita Hayworth and Gene Kelly; Kelly had been loaned to Columbia for this film and built the choreography himself. Its most cited passage is the Alter Ego dance, in which Kelly dances with his own reflection, a scene that required extremely difficult optical work for its time. The colour and the songs by Jerome Kern and Ira Gershwin carry it. Long Ago and Far Away became one of the year's biggest sellers. The story is simple and the show is high. Who it is for: viewers who like classic Hollywood musicals and Gene Kelly. Who it is not for: anyone looking for a strong story.