That's Entertainment, Part II

The film is assembled from the archive of the MGM studio: musicals, comedies, dramatic passages and dance numbers. It follows the first compilation of two years earlier, and this time it is not confined to musicals. Gene Kelly directs. Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly present the linking sections together, and new material was shot for them; these are the last recordings of the two of them dancing together. The titles and the interstitial design are by Saul Bass. What the compilation shows is the studio system itself: the same dancers, the same composers and the same technical crews worked in the same place for years, and that is the source of the consistency on screen. Its problem is the logic of a selection. The scenes come one after another without context and after a while it stops mattering what is being watched from which film. Fred Astaire was in his mid seventies and the newly shot dance passages were arranged accordingly; even so they are the liveliest parts of the film. It appeared when the classic Hollywood musical was long finished, and the tone is openly turned to the past. Who it is for: viewers who like classic Hollywood musicals and anyone interested in the history of dance. Who it is not for: there is no narrative, the structure is scattered, and for anyone who saw the first compilation the sense of repetition is strong.