The Alice Faye Collection: Lillian Russell / On the Avenue / That Night In Rio / The Gang's All Here [4The Alice Faye Collection: Lillian Russell / On the Avenue / That Night In Rio / The Gang's All Here [4

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MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

    The Alice Faye Collection is a handy four-movie DVD set, containing Lillian Russell, On the Avenue, That Night in Rio, and The Gang's All Here, all of which are also available separately. Lillian Russell's major special feature is a documentary short on the actual Russell, a renowned singer of the 1890s and early 20th century. On the Avenue, built on the music of Irving Berlin, gets a full-blown commentary track by the scholar Miles Kreuger and a documentary about Alice Faye's screen career. That Night in Rio gets a documentary about Faye's off-screen life, plus an unused musical number with Faye and co-star Don Ameche appended. And The Gang's All Here, the most important of the four movies, gets the most substantial treatment, with a commentary track, a documentary, a very funny unused scene from the movie, and a pair of radio shows featuring Faye. Each film in that package is contained in a slim case that slides into a standard slipcase. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

DVD FEATURES:
  • Number of Discs: 4
  • Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 (Pre-1954 Standard)
  • Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo
  • Features:
    • Lillian Russell: documentary feature on the real Lilian Russell
    • On the Avenue: deleted scene with the Ritz Brothers
    • Featurette - Alice Faye: a Life on Screen
    • That Night in Rio: deleted scene with Faye & Ameche
    • Featurette Alice Faye: a Life Off Screen
    • The Gang's All Here:
    • Deleted scene
    • Alice Faye/Phil Harris Radio show
AWARDS
  • Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
  •     Nominated Best Black and White Art Direction - 1940 (Joseph C. Wright, Richard Day)
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
REVIEWS:
  • Almost dripping with Technicolor, That Night in Rio stands as a monument to the wartime "Good Neighbor" policy (in fact, the Brazilian ambassador to Washington pronounced it "the kind of picture that will be helpful to North and South American relations") and to the by no means small talents of Carmen Miranda. Playing the jealous fiancee with her special blend of language-mangling vigor, Miranda takes center stage in two of her all-time best production numbers, "Chica, Chica, Boom Chic," performed with leading man Don Ameche, and "I, Yi, Yi, Yi (I Like You Very Much)." She fills the film with her presence, leaving scant room for nominal leading lady Alice Faye, whose confused baroness (is Ameche her husband or the impostor of the husband pretending to be the impostor?) is left to warble the rather more sedate "They Met in Rio." The story, such as it is, is the by-now well-known fairy tale of a musical entertainer hired to impersonate his lookalike, a financially strapped business tycoon. Faye, Ameche, and such character players as J. Carrol Naish, Curt Bois, and Frank Puglia give that plot all the serious attention it merits -- in other words, none -- and that is as it should be. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi
  • As with most musical comedies intended as morale boosters during World War II, The Gang's All Here has lots of "plot" of the romantic sort, but not much story. Director and choreographer Busby Berkeley, in his only Fox film and his first film in Technicolor, not only gets the camera moving in directions and from angles that seem impossible to emulate in real life, but twists the two-dimensional space of the screen and the three-dimensional space of the sets into new shapes. The camera sometimes seems to swing around through 360 degrees, presenting musical numbers on a stage that, at various moments, seems to stretch into infinity, and grow in several directions that wouldn't seem to leave room for any audience, yet somehow manage to. Coupled with Carmen Miranda's outsized personality and a lot of still-very-amusing comic bits by Edward Everett Horton, Charlotte Greenwood (who dances up a storm in one scene), comedian and radio personality Phil Baker, and Eugene Pallette (aided by some amazingly accurate studio recreations of New York streets, Grand Central Station, and the Staten Island Ferry), the film keeps us moving, laughing, and humming, and also tapping our feet to the beat of Benny Goodman's orchestra. Berkeley's use of special effects in the service of dance is extraordinary -- gravity seems to disappear at various points, strange, unearthly rings surround performers in mid-air, and nightclubs interiors suddenly lose their walls and ceilings and even their stages, which suddenly become bigger than any building that they could seemingly ever contain them. What makes it all even more amazing to modern viewers is that Berkeley did all of this for real -- on the soundstage, with cranes and lighting, shifting sets, invisible mountings, and using devices as simple as phosphorescent hula hoops -- with no CGI or post-production super-imposing, just a lot of guts, planning, and great editing (some of which anticipates what Alfred Hitchcock did on Rope with its seamless edits of extended takes), and all on a budget that wouldn't have paid for the costumes in a James Cameron epic. In the major number from the film's first half, "The Lady in the Tutti-Frutti Hat," amid the shifting spatial dimensions captured by the camera -- where a single prop tree suddenly multiplies to infinity, and fruit turn into xylophones -- Carmen Miranda sings while what look like hundreds of chorus girls sway back and forth in carefully choreographed patterns, carrying oversized bananas. This leads to an overhead Berkeley-style kaleidoscope shot of the chorus girls that's as dazzling as it is tasteless, and it ends up at a climactic shot of Miranda seemingly wearing a "hat" hundreds of times her size, made of nothing but fruit. Benny Goodman also sings a pair of numbers, and the odd thing he's not bad -- he's no Sinatra (not even Nancy Sinatra) or Perry Como, but he does okay. So forget the plot -- or take in the plot, if that's your choice (the jokes still work, and it's nice to remember that there were wars worth fighting and believing in) -- and sit back and enjoy this unique visual/dance/musical fantasy, which boasts some of the strangest arrays of images, color, and music this side of Disney's Fantasia. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi
  • One of the more enjoyable backstage musicals of the 1930s, On the Avenue is different from many others in the genre in that it's concerned with a show that has already opened, rather than one that is steaming ahead toward opening night. Avenue also benefits from a script in which the pieces all fall into place naturally; the plot has its holes, but the film has such an amiable feeling that the viewer is willing to overlook them. While the dialogue is not in a class by itself, it has a certain combination of whimsy and winsomeness to it that is quite appealing. Of greater importance, Avenue boasts a first-class Irving Berlin score that includes the infectious "I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm," the slightly melancholy "This Year's Kisses," and the beguiling "You're Laughing at Me." Avenue is also helped by its solid cast, with Dick Powell providing a smooth sound in the songs and an easy charm in his scenes and Madeleine Carroll creating an imperious rich girl that still manages to win the viewer's heart. Alice Faye is in top-notch form, pouring her creamy tones into her singing and imbuing her character with a combination of vulnerability and sauciness that's quite touching. The Ritz Brothers are given too much screen time for their own good, as is the cringe-inducing Stepin Fetchit, but Cora Witherspoon's breeziness helps to compensate for them. Smoothly directed by Roy Del Ruth, Avenue is a pleasant stroll for musical fans. ~ Craig Butler, Rovi

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