This movie, made at the zenith of Astaire and Roger's popularity, is one of their lesser works—especially given the time in which it was made. They had already made: Flying Down to Rio (1933), The Gay Divorcée (1934), Roberta (1935), Top Hat (1935), Follow the Fleet (1936) and Swing Time (1936), and Shall We Dance (1937). The movie (Carefree) would be followed by The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939) and later, The Barkleys of Broadway (1949). So this would be the 8th of their 10 movie dancing projects together.As the movie opens, we see Steve Arden (Ralph Bellamy) in what would become one of his best stock straight-man roles, that of the want-to-be husband waiting to marry the movie's leading lady, who invariably ends up with the film's leading man. This is a role that he had held in Leo McCarey's The Awful Truth (1937) and would later hold in Howard Hawks' His Gal Friday (1940), losing the leading lady to the Cary Grant it both cases. In this case, his would-be wife is Amanda (Ginger Rogers). Since Steve fails to get Amanda to the alter, he calls on his old friend and psychoanalyst Tony Flagg (Fred Astaire) to help persuade her to overcome her lack of commitment to him. As Amanda and Steve's friends and family—I loved Luella Gear's dry humor as Amanda's Aunt Cora--following Tony and Amanda around to see how he is progressing with the persuasion. The movie takes us from place to place where a lot of singing, dancing, and comedy unfold. The most memorable song in the movies is Irving Berlin's 'Change Partners and Dance.'Another memorable moment is the dance that Astaire did at the driving range while hitting golf balls as part of the routine. Fred and Ginger had a couple of memorable dances in the movie: A swing number called 'The Yam,' and a slow motion dream sequence, 'I Used to Be Color Blind. The latter was a sequence that was OBVIOUSLY meant to be shot in color and wasn't due to RKO's budgetary restrains at the time.

Those who say that Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire made the same movie ten times over must not have seen at least half of their films. FLYING DOWN TO RIO is utterly different to anything that follows, and FOLLOW THE FLEET is as easily distinguishable from SWING TIME in its plotting as it is from SINGING IN THE RAIN. THE STORY OF VERNON AND IRENE CASTLE isn't even a comedy even if it is a musical. And then there's CAREFREE.CAREFREE has a different flavor to anything that came before it. As many have said, it's really a Screwball Comedy with a few musical numbers tossed in. Amanda (Ginger Rogers) is either a classic screwball heiress or at least something very close to it (she may have hit it big through her singing career). It's Ginger's character that is the center of this film, not Fred's, and it's easy to understand why the European title was, indeed, 'AMANDA'. The sets, costume designs, orchestrations, even the style of the dances tend to point ahead to the forties rather than back towards the thirties. 'The Yam' almost seems like something that Mickey and Judy would do rather than Fred and Ginger. The story is structured as a parody (of psychoanalysis) and its humor is more physical than verbal. In many ways, CAREFREE is quite different.For the first time, Fred Astaire plays something other than a glorified juvenile. I find him more convincing as a psychiatrist (albeit a very poor psychiatrist) than some do; in any event, it was a necessary move for his career. That comedy seems emphasized over the musical numbers runs parallel with the development of Ginger Rogers' career, which had very few musicals left in it. CAREFREE seems like a return to the old partnership, but I think it equally serves as an early step into the future for both of its stars.The Irving Berlin score is good but not up to his earlier efforts for Astaire and Rogers. It's not up to what Kern and the Gershwins had produced for them, either. 'The Yam' proved a much better song to dance to than it was to sing, and 'I Used to be Colorblind' obviously begs for the color treatment that it never received. CAREFREE was the first Astaire/Rogers film (and I believe the only one) to not turn a profit. This was not so much due to a lack of revenue, which was approximately equal to THE GAY Divorcée's, but to increased costs, particularly the stars' salaries. Previous success had priced them into the position of needing a huge hit in order to turn a profit. CAREFREE did well, but it wasn't a huge hit.Astaire's golfing solo dance was probably more notable for his golfing than it was for his dancing. All duffers (such as myself) are astounded, but if you've never held a golf club in your hands it probably doesn't seem like much. That slow motion and a kiss are the most memorable things about the 'Color Blind' number says everything you need to know about its terpsichorean importance. Personally, I like 'The Yam' a lot. Travelling all over the country club, it's actually Fred & Ginger's longest dance number together and builds to a thrilling climax during which, for once, you can actually see Fred Astaire straining during a dance as he repeatedly lifts Ginger Rogers over his leg and around those tables. The hypnotic dance to Change Partners strikes me as rather gimmicky and is the shortest of their major duets.Fred acts his role well but really has little to do. Ginger has all the major comedic set-pieces and carries them off with flair. It's probably the only time in the series other than ROBERTA in which she was able to use her full comical abilities. Both actors met the poignancy angle of the script exceptionally well (as they had in SWING TIME) and you wonder what they might have produced if RKO had given them more opportunities in that direction. I also enjoyed Luella Gear as Ginger's aunt. Ginger had lacked an older female to confide in during SHALL WE DANCE and the character was greatly missed.CAREFREE is a fine film. I'd rank it somewhere from 5-7 in the Astaire/Rogers cannon depending on my mood.

On my first viewing of Carefree, I experienced something I never thought I would with Fred and Ginger, boredom. Initially I was expecting another spectacular musical showcase, however the film is on a smaller scale (their shortest at only 80 minutes) than their previous outings and only contains a mere four musical numbers; making it more of a comedy with some singing and dancing than a full fledged musical. With several movies behind them following a similar formula, if they were going to make another then they had to do something different or things would have become stale. I wished though that Fred Astaire could have done straight comedies during his career; Carefree is the closest thing to that.None of the musical numbers in Carefree stand out as being among the best in the series. Fred Astaire's number in which he plays golf while tap dancing sounds better on paper than it does in execution. I'm sure what he's doing is no easy task yet it doesn't look all that impressive to watch. The Yam on the other hand is a pretty standard number, but heck, it's still Fred and Ginger dancing. I find the film's most interest musical number is 'I Used to be Color Blind', the most experimental in the film, shot in slow motion and allowing the viewer to see Fred and Ginger's grace in every detail.For the only time in the series, Astaire plays a character who is not a dancer by profession, but rather a psychiatrist (although they do make sure to mention he once had aspirations of becoming a dancer). I don't completely buy Astaire as a psychiatrist, but realism is not what these movies are about. Plus I'm sure the psychology on display here is of the "you are getting sleepy" variety as seen in movies. He doesn't break his professional ethics though by pursuing his patient like his stalkerish attitude towards Ginger in other films in the series, instead she wants him.Carefree belongs to Ginger, playing a character whom has been put under hypnosis, giving her the opportunity to completely goof around in a child like manner with big wide eyes, and it's pretty funny stuff. How many movies do you get to see Ginger Rogers wielding a shot gun? Everyone needs at least one movie where they get to act stupid. The comedic assets of Ralph Bellamy and Jack Carson are a big benefits to the film's witty dialogue, where much of the film's strength lies. Even if the dance numbers don't fully exceed, as a screwball comedy, Carefree grows on me, of course I am a sucker for these movies and the Astaire/Rodgers name, so good enough for me!

After the exceedingly strange Michael Jackson died recently, I was reminded by a sage friend that Jackson had revived dance after a long drought, for a new generation. And I shook my head in grudging respect; he was right. The Musical, which practically dried up in the 80s was displaced to consumable single songs and dance numbers (music videos). And a new, unaware generation applauded every expansion of that format by MJ, not knowing he was traveling already-covered ground, inching ever closer to the full length movie musical. Jackson did restore respect and cachet to dance. He is not so different from Astaire.Carefree offers a comic turn from the tap dancing couple, and in a rare move Ginger pursues Fred this time. Rogers is funnier than usual in this one. It's quite short and at the 50 minute mark a dance number erupts called "the Yam." After I saw the exhilarating number "Pick Yourself Up" in Shall we Dance I had the feeling the team could not possibly do better, and trailed off watching their movies with maybe five to go. What great fun to stumble across this, and be reminded of the exalted place jubilance occupies in the world of dance.The Yam number starts quite corny, and then Astaire and Rogers begin traveling around all the rooms and obstacles in a multi-room restaurant. I love that the scale of the number keeps growing (in terms of couples), and that you don't know where they're heading next. At a time when the grotesque failings of society are glaring, the fantasy presented in musicals that some parts of society function so well that they occasionally function almost as syncopated machinery is very pleasing. The Yam is pretty cool ...in a way that a thousand dancers around a phony Venice lagoon inside a gigantic soundstage is just not. That's about spectacle, I watch A & R because the focus is on dance. The movie is blessedly free of the usual climactic love dance (which is always lame) seen in their other movies.