Robert Walker stars as composer Jerome Kern in this biopic Till the Clouds Roll By, sadly released the year after Kern's death. We learn of his early compositions, his collaboration and lifelong friendship with James Hessler, played by Van Heflin, and his romance and marriage to Eva, played by Dorothy Patrick. The biographical portion is really only half the film—or less—with the remainder of the two hour fifteen minute running time filled in with performances of Kern's songs.Usually, I wouldn't balk at the idea of an all-star singing extravaganza, but this film isn't nearly as fun to watch as That's Entertainment. I actually turned this movie off the first time I tried to get through it. It's terribly boring, and even though Judy Garland, Lena Horne, Kathryn Grayson, Van Johnson, June Allyson, Angela Lansbury, and Dinah Shore lend their talents, the songs are hardly entertaining.The first part of the movie is basically a taped version of the stage musical Show Boat. Of the five songs are showcased, two are sung too fast and two are sung without any feeling at all. Even though Kathryn Grayson was in the film remake of Show Boat five years later, in this movie she gives an entirely different interpretation to the songs, and not for the better. Her costar in the songs, Tony Martin, wears a dead pan expression on his face the entire time. Where was Howard Keel? As if the filmmakers knew to save one of only well sung songs for the end, Frank Sinatra sings a repeat of "Old Man River", hoping to distract the audience from the previously torturous two hours.

Robert Walker is composer Jerome Kern is this MGM musical, where the real star are the musical numbers featuring stars like Judy Garland, Lena Horne, June Allyson, Tony Martin, Frank Sinatra, Angela Lansbury and Kathryn Grayson. The actual plot of young "Jerry" starting his career and finding love was more interesting than I had expected. I had not seen this in years and did not have any memory of it to speak of. But of course it's the music that you'll love the best here. The upbeat songs are very perky and the more serious songs are very moving and beautiful. One particular highlight is Judy washing dishes and singing "Look for the Silver Lining." You've never really heard that song until you've heard Judy Garland sing it. Frank Sinatra sings "Old Man River," but, while somewhat dramatic, I don't think his voice is suited for that song. But I do have some major criticisms about the film: Robert Walker's performance as the elder Kern left a lot to be desired. The less said the better. Because of an unnecessary overly dramatic subplot of Lucille Bremer being mad of being slighted in a musical show, the second half drags and the film felt way too long. Frankly it was very hard to get through, except for the musical numbers of course. This is the kind of movie to watch about every 5-7 years for the musical numbers, which was why I watched this. I thought about making this a '7', but due to Walker's wooden performance as the elder Kern and an unbearable second hour, this is yet another MGM musical whose parts are better than the whole.

I avoided this film for all these years (I am 64 now), and only watched it now because I had just watched the Marilyn Miller biopic ("Look For The Silver Lining"), and so many mentioned Judy Garland's portrayal of Miller here as so much better than June Haver's in "Look For...". Well, let's get a couple of things straight. Judy Garland didn't look anything at all like Marilyn Miller, nor did she sound anything at all like Marilyn Miller. So this nonsense about how wonderful Garland's portrayal of Marilyn Miller in this film is just hogwash. I don't even think she sang "Look For The Silver Lining" very well here; she did a wonderful rendition of "Who" here, however. But for those of you who think she was so exquisite here, I guess you base your opinion on the one thing they had in common. Know what it was??? But now, back to this film. To be honest, the film was an excuse for MGM to develop another lavish musical...something that no other studio did so well. They came up with a darned good script, albeit another highly fictionalized biography of a famous entertainment figure. To be honest, I enjoyed the fictionalized story more than I did the production numbers...even though I admire Kern's work a great deal.Odd thing about the casting. I don't enjoy film performances by either Robert Walker or Van Heflin. Yet, in this film I thought they were both excellent! As to the negatives of casting -- Lucille Bremer's performance late in the film was very unconvincing.Now, the big controversy in the film was the concluding production number -- Frank Sinatra singing "Old Man River". If you're having a problem with that White guy singing a Black song...get over it. It was written by a White guy (the film is about that White composer). It was written for Broadway of that era...so it was mostly written for White audiences. But MOST importantly, music knows no race. Nat King Cole can interpret "Dance Ballerina, Dance", just as Frank Sinatra can interpret "Old Man River". A jazz musician can interpret a pop classic. Music belongs to everyone. And, incidentally, the best rendition of "Old Man River" I ever heard was Sinatra's interpretation on his Reprise album "The Concert Sinatra" from 1962. But even here, in 1946, Sinatra's performance of the number is strong and flawless (unless you obsess about a pigmentation problem). And just for the record, I generally disdain Sinatra recordings from before the mid-1950s.While not at the top of my list of MGM movie musicals and biopics, this is a good one. Recommended.

This was MGM's slogan throughout most of it's heyday, and it's never more apparent than in this lavish Technicolor film, which was the studio's big Christmas 1946 release. This may have been released somewhat earlier, if not for a strike at Technicolor which held up sufficient release prints for a general release. If some criticize the story for taking liberties with Jerome Kern's less-than-thrilling real life story, this is more than made up for by showcasing MGM's finest talent in a Niagara Falls cascade of terrific musical numbers. The first section of the film is devoted to a capsule digest version of "Show Boat", and that whets the appetite for the many now-classic numbers which follow. This film exemplifies why the MGM musical is held in such high regard. Beautiful orchestrations, top-talent, and an overall lavishness that would have made Ziegfeld himself proud. Back in 1973, this film made headlines with the fact that the MGM lawyers failed to renew the copyright on this picture, so it, along with Royal Wedding and several others, have made it, over the years, to the public-domain VHS and DVD releases. This is one of many classic all-star films which MGM released over the years. While this film is rather long, it goes by quickly due to the constant stream of great musical numbers contained within. If you love "classic" talent, the kind our parents and grandparents grew up with, you will enjoy "Till The Clouds Roll By".