Roxie Hart

If you are a Ginger Rogers fan, you should enjoy this film about a media circus trial framed in a flashback. The acting in this film is over the top and matches the pacing.

Chicago (1927) is one of my favorite silent comedies, so it was a delight to see this sound adaptation. And with bubbly Ginger Rogers to boot! So snappy and ridiculous! Absurdly framed, dripping in sarcasm. So wonderful. But with all that was great about it, Roxie Hart (1942) felt like a imitation, mimicking everything that made the silent movie great. It made this great too, especially with such a excellent ensemble of characters, but it lacked the natural beat of madness this play possess.

I appreciate this much more than I *like* it. The conceit is one that I am not taken with, but Wellman directs with vigor and fortitude which makes up with for that.

Ginger Rogers is given free reign in an otherwise bland adaptation and she takes the opportunity to chew the scenery and mug for the camera. She's fun, everyone else has a moment or two, but it feels pretty hollow.

Wellman literally adds the noises of cats fighting over two women having a fistfight. Pretty bland story, okay direction. And the ending stinks.

80.000

79.500

Crowded Chicago burlesque which now seems less funny than it did but is full of smart moments.

It's glorious, hilarious and mean-spirited. The basis for Chicago, it's certainly a remarkable story.