While it is a shame Douglas Fairbanks' career fizzled out with the advent of sound, when you watch something like Reaching for the Moon (1930) it isn't hard to see why that was the case. It has nothing to do with Fairbanks' voice or line delivery or any lack of charm on his part-- it's the material that frankly bites. Reaching for the Moon began life as a musical, but the waning popularity of the musical at the ox office made the suits panic and scrap all but one of the numbers before release. The meddling shows in the choppy rhythm of the picture. This single number retained, "When the Folks High Up Do the Big Low-Down," is the highlight of the movie, the one scene with great energy and fun. Everything else lacks pacing, the characters are one-note and boring. Fairbanks and Bebe Daniels are good performers, but they have no chemistry and have to deal with a dog of a script. It's a real shame.

'Reaching for the Moon' is interesting for being one of the few talkies/sound pictures that silent star Douglas Fairbanks, and for seeing singing/crooning legend Bing Crosby in a very early role.It is a decent, at its best great, film in its own right. But in serious need of a restoration other than the shoddy DVD it's presently got, with its crackling and sometimes muffled sound quality and haphazard and lacking in sharpness picture quality, that does cheapen an otherwise good-looking film. It does stick out like a sore thumb when the production values of the actual film look great and like real care went into them, but the DVD looks like it was made in haste and with limited technology.There is not an awful lot wrong with the film itself. The storytelling is a little jumpy and incomplete at points early on, which does suggest heavy editing and cuts. Fairbanks is a mixed bag, he is fun and charming with envious athleticism but he also does try too hard in some of his line delivery and a few facial expressions and his voice doesn't fit his persona, one would expect one more muscular rather than the anaemic one here, an example of a transition from silent to talkie being less than smooth.Despite the DVD quality, 'Reaching for the Moon' does look as though it was made with love and care. The costumes are lavish and the photography skillful and often luminous but the biggest star is the incredible art-deco sets, a masterpiece of art-deco design. The music is melodious, romantic and beautifully orchestrated, while Irving Berlin's "When the Folks High Up Do the Mean Low-Down" is the highlight of the film, so much so that one does really wish that there were more songs as apparently intended. The script is witty and romantically heartfelt, while a vast majority of the story goes at a snappy pace and entertains and moves.Very nicely directed too, and apart from reservations about Fairbanks the cast are uniformly good. Edward Everett Horton's very funny performance is particularly great, while Claud Allistair also has fun. Bebe Daniels is a beguiling screen presence and sings a dream. Even so early on in his career, Crosby's voice still makes one want to listen to him for hours and still can't get enough of, just wish that he had more than one song.Overall, interesting early talkie and a nice film, but desperately needs restoration. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Douglas Fairbanks was 47 years old when he starred in "Reaching for the Moon," and in nine more years, he would be dead from a heart attack. He had only two more starring roles after this, and ended his career with only five movies since the advent of sound. While bickering with Hollywood moguls is cited as the main reason for his early retirement by age 51, his few "talkies" hint at his fading star. No one could doubt his continued athleticism. In this movie, he showed some of the moves and agility that made him the king of the swashbucklers throughout the silent film era. But two things seemed to me to detract from his screen persona. First was his bombast and flamboyance. Surely, these were attributes in silent films when facial expressions and body movements were exaggerated to make up for the lack of sound. Fairbanks seems to be one of those early era actors who couldn't adjust to the less audacious acting. The second thing was his high-pitched voice. It wasn't effeminate, but its higher pitch did detract from the rougher masculine image of his leading role. Bebe Daniels, on the other hand, had no difficulty transitioning from silent to sound film. She started as a child actress and had a long string of movies through the end of the silent era. She had a beautiful singing voice and had a number of good roles in musical films through the 1930s. She married actor/singer Ben Lyon in 1930, and in the late 30s they moved to England where they were a very successful husband-and- wife team on stage and on the radio. This was also just the third appearance of Bing Crosby in the movies. Although his name had not yet appeared in any film credits – and wouldn't until the following year, he did have one song in this shortened film version. It also was the first film with Irving Berlin's music. The plot of this film is OK, but the script doesn't make it very convincing. Still, it is an entertaining film with some historical value as well. It gives us a picture of the Hollywood scene during the years of transition from silent to sound films. We see some of the stars of those early years. And, one more little note of history to me was the setting of the ship voyage during the stock market crash of October 29, 1929. Not many movies were made that had the great stock market crash in them. It's understandable that Hollywood wouldn't draw people to movies about depression, with the widespread depression that followed. But the treatment of the stock crash in this film gives it a nice added historical touch about an event that is rarely found in films of the mid-20th century.

Larry (Douglas Fairbanks) follows Viv (Bebe Daniels) to Southampton on a cruise ship. He takes his valet Roger (Edward Everett Horton) with him and Larry tries to win Viv's heart despite the fact that she is engaged to Sir Horace (Claud Allister).......things work out in the end.The film is a bore. It is only saved by the musical number - an upbeat jivey tune - that is sung by Bing Crosby, Bebe Daniels and June MacCloy as "Kitty" (check out her peculiar voice!) and has the cast dancing along. It is the ONLY good part of the film. That and the sets are the reason I have given the film a mark of 5. There are some great sets, eg, the office desk panels that open up into seats and pretty much every interior that you see! The script is dull and it's not particularly funny despite Douglas Fairbanks. Fairbanks provides some unintentional humour with his pointless leaping about. It's endless! And he has a terrible, shouty voice which makes him a pretty irritating man. Combine that with his endless inane grinning and you have to submit and start laughing at him. Hatred turns to mockery.It's all quite poignant, though as his character seems not to be able to cope with being mocked. He is continually asking Bebe Daniles "are you laughing at me?" and the audience is continually yelling back "Yes!" Without the music and sets, this film is a piece of junk.