There are fabulous talents involved in this film, but the result is not as good as I expected. Cole Porter's songs are surprisingly undistinguished, and there's not quite as much singing and dancing as there could be. The settings and costuming are great however, and keep the eye entertained. Love those 50's wasp waists and bouffant skirts! The screenplay is sharp, the acting good, and the intriguing story keeps bowling along.Predictable it's not. Kay Kendall displays her talent for comedy, but for me the standout is Mitzi Gaynor. She is a snappy little actress and a lithe and fluid dancer. In this vehicle she outclasses Gene Kelly who falls short of his usual charm. Taina Elg (who?)is pretty enough, but to me does not have any charisma. Overall, while witty and entertaining, the story is lacking in warmth and romance. Maybe it's too witty: the stuff about relationships is pretty cynical. To summarize, it falls short on delivering the magic of the great musicals. You won't fall asleep, but you won't be singing or dancing around the living room either. 6 out of 10.

This DVD belongs to the Warner box-set. Actually, it's a gift from my late colleague who retired from work. As I thanked her, I said that she chose finely because it would be the oldest movies I would reviewed and they are classics that worth discovering.But I was afraid that they could be boring. In fact, dance and me are like dogs and cats: Personnaly, I don't dance (but neither have been invited either)and I can't stand watching dance nowadays: video clips degrade this art. But as soon as I watched the documentary bonus "Gene Kelly: anatomy of a dancer", I admit that I was wrong.Gene is the kind of people that draws my admiration: hardworking, righteous, blue-collar but classy and above all, compassionate. He succeeds in making me appreciate his art and it has been a incredible feat. "The Girls" is a fine movie. Its story uses a guaranteed funny trick: same events told by different people. (See the X-Files episode "Bad Blood" from the fifth season for another example). As the characters live in the same building, they built a sort of community that it accurately depicted because I lived this experience too. The musical sequences being light, it's more a comedy with music than a musical with humor.In conclusion, follow me and discover this old movie as well!

Cole Porter's score is far from his best and you probably would never guess that George Cukor directed it and Gene Kelly, although he dances as well as ever, isn't well served by either the script or indeed the choreographer, (it's virtually a supporting role). But what it has in spades are the Les Girls of the title; Mitzi Gaynor, (she's the 'sassy' bundle of fun), Taina Elg, (the gold-digger) and that great leggy British comedienne Kay Kendall who is not particularly well served by the script either but who is so graceful and witty and sophisticated she can lift the material. She isn't as good here as she was in "Genevieve" but she is better than anyone else in the movie and she won a Golden Globe for it, (though Elg, too, is a duplicitous little spitfire and is probably better here than in anything else she did). It looks fabulous, (Orry-Kelly's costumes won an Oscar), but, as we know, looks aren't everything. Nobody's finest hour, then, but neither is it totally negligible.

Though made near the end of MGM's Golden years, LES GIRLS was a stylish and entertaining musical that brought to mind the Japanese tale "Rashoman" where we are given one story told from three very different points of view. The film opens with Lady Sybil Wren (the late great Kay Kendall), an elegant British bombshell, being taken to court for libel after the publication of a book she wrote about her experiences as the member of a song and dance troupe known as Les Girls. What we then get is a flashback where we meet Barry Nichols (Gene Kelly)the leader of the act and his girls, the aforementioned Sybil, a bubbly American named Joy (Mitzi Gaynor)and an exotic French beauty named Angele (Taina Elg). According to Sybil, Barry toyed with her affections, making her think he loved her, but Angele's version of the story reveals he made her feel the same way, but Barry, now married to Joy, does finally take the stand and tells his version of what happened, which is apparently what really happened. Stylish direction by George Cukor, a surprisingly meaty screenplay for an MGM musical, and some great musical sequences make for an offbeat but nonetheless richly entertaining film, which, if truth be told, is effortlessly stolen by Kay Kendall, whose luminous performance as Sybil lights up the screen, especially in a riotous comic duet she performs with Kelly called "You're Just Too Too.." Kendall was a supremely gifted actress taken from us much too soon and this film is ample proof of that. A nearly forgotten and underrated MGM classic.