I like the beginning. We see a view through the clouds of heaven. Along the way, Shakespeare has a little place in the sky too. We see Ziegfeld's, a classy little bedroom type of place with a balcony and golden artifacts. William Powell was quite relaxed there while reminiscing and wishing he could go back and do his follies again. Nostalgia is nice. We then see some clay versions of Ziegfeld's shows. There was quite a good clay model likeness, sight and sound, of "To be jolly" (from "The great Ziegfeld") at the theater, Fannie Brice ("ah-ha! I'm an Indian" ), Will Rogers and Eddie Canter (both reprising their roles from "The great Ziegfeld". Rogers with his "well er, I don't have anything funny to say, except er what I read in the papers" and Cantor reprising his performance of "If you knew Suzie"). Here were the following great skits I enjoyed.Fred Astaire and "Bring on the beautiful ladies with a bunch of nice looking gals singing including Virginia O'brien singing nicely and Lucille Ball too. The women that come dancing are a little older. Some may wonder why they didn't use younger women, the reason is is that those middle aged women were real former Ziegfeld girls from the 1910s and 1920s, and I for one really liked that.Katherine Grayson's beauty and lovely singing. I don't understand why so many people in the 21st century dislike opera. The old fashoined music lovers, besides me are few and far between now and not often anyone under 60. Anyway, Katherine Grayson's voice is so beautiful, it's extremely talented, and Katherine is gorgeous in her sweet old fashioned way. The ballroom dancing scene Traviata. Very nice. The music, the girls and their ballroom floorlength gowns were all beautiful. Esther swimming was great as always. Even though her water ballets in "Bathing beauty" and "This time for keeps" were her very best, most of her others were not far behind in greatness. Judy Garland, wonderful and beautiful in so many of her films. Very good here.Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly's skit. This is one of the only times when those two fabulous golden agers starred together. How can that not be great?The Fanny Brice part was hilarious. I liked Fanny in her 1930s work including "The great Ziegfeld" and "Everybody sing". Here, she is very funny. She finds her sweepstakes ticket is a winner. Her reaction is funny when learning what her daft husband did. Husband: "I was short $2.50 paying the rent so I gave the landlord our sweepstake ticket Fanny: "so what" (suddenly gasps in surprise, angry) "Honey, you should drop dead!" Husband: "I thinking of jumping out that window" Fanny: "who's stopping you?". All funny. Then the amusing tactics of Fanny and husband trying numerous ways to get the ticket back. Very good funny segment.The Kenan Wynn skit was pretty good. He gets increasingly frustrated during a phone call while trying to connect a number with an operator who kept jerking him around in amusing ways but was linking up everyone around him just fine on their phone calls. And Kenan finally gettong so frustrated he starts eat the phone. It was funny. I also liked Kenan in some of his other stuff though, such as "Neptune's daughter" and "Me and my gal" with Judy.The Red Skeleton skit was only fair. He wasn't as good as he's been in some of his other stuff such as in Esther Williams' "Neptune's daughter" and "Bathing beauty" (the ballet class scene in that film was hilarious). The Victor Moore "Just pay the two dollars!" skit was a funny idea that had a lot of funny jokes in it. But Victor Moore is just too whiny. He's also too whiny in "Gold diggers 37" which put a bit of a damper in that otherwise great film.Overall, this was another very good old time classic film

Lucille Ball excellent. Cracking that whip. Dressed in pink. Those cats. Meow.Tap extravaganza with Astaire and Kelly. Too awesome. A pairing for the ages.Booze Skelton sketch delightful, and memorable.Two dollars. I always remember that one.Charise beautiful pointe ballet dancer. Also great pair dancers were Bremer and Astaire.O'Brien always excellent in her deadpan singing -- witness The Harvey Girls.William Powell great, as always. I liked the heavenly Shakespeare, Barnum and Ziegfeld motifs, as well as the dolls in the beginning. These dolls are so darling and lifelike.This movie was released the year I was born. The War -- World War Two -- was over, and people wanted to relax and enjoy life. The actual Ziegfeld had actually passed away the previous decade, the victim of bankruptcy and IMO the First World War taking away his audience and subsequently causing more people to leave the old ways behind (live performances) and prefer silent and then sound films.In real life, it is said that Ziegfeld's wife, Billie Burke, went back to work to pay Ziegfeld's bills -- he apparently was wiped out in the Stock Market Crash of 1929. He passed away a few years later. Billie had been a stage star in New York City for Charles Frohman pre-World War One, married Ziegfeld and retired from performing (to Frohman's disapproval and disgust). She had a daughter with Ziegfeld named Patricia. You will see Billie in some 1930s and 1940s films, including the blockbuster The Wizard of Oz -- portraying Glinda, the Good Witch of the North. She looked beautiful in her tall crown and pink gauzy gown in that movie, and in other movies she was well known for portraying her ditzy, comedic, goofy society matrons.This movie portrays the deceased Ziegfeld as living in the lap of luxury, but his real life ended, I feel, in near poverty. Still, I enjoyed the heavenly furnishings, etc., near the beginning of this film.I am an historian of theatre and film. I have a B.A. Degree in History. I am also a futurist, meaning that we study the past and discuss trends leading to the future. I have studied theatrical critiquing and cinematic techniques. I enjoy studying the lives of actors and actresses, in stage, film and television, both present and past, but especially in the past.I enjoy historical films, as well as song and dance musicals. This film fits these categories.10/10

I'm a huge fan of this kind of entertainment, but I have to say I was mightily disappointed. Standouts were Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly and Fanny Brice. But some of the scenes were tedious and unwatchable. With such a great line-up of stars, this should have been a much better movie. With a few exceptions, I didn't care for the choice of music. I can always watch and enjoy Astaire and Kelly, but even those two were, I thought, not showcasing their best material. I was surprised to see Fanny Brice looking in her prime. I thought she belonged to a much older generation. Was she still active in the forties? Apparently so. An appearance by Eddie Cantor, arguably one of Ziegfeld's top stars would have been a real treat.

Given how much I love musicals, this was disappointing. It's a mish-mash of musical numbers and comedy routines from an all-star MGM cast, and it's only really worth watching for a couple of segments. The comedy bits are awful. I ended up skipping through the Red Skelton bit because I found it all so annoying. I watched the film primarily to see Kelly and Astaire dance together, and I'm glad I did, but it's an odd number. Neither look entirely comfortable throughout. Out of all the big name players, Astaire gets the most screen time in this, although he is partnered with Lucille Bremer in two of them, who is clearly far beneath him as a dancing partner. Her dancing lacks any personality or passion, and she's very limited (a debuting Cyd Charisse, dancing with the bubbles, would have been much better!). But the numbers are exquisitely staged, and the Technicolour is lovely. Garland's number is okay, because she has a great talent for comedy, but she never gets to belt it out so she's wasted. The less said about the pretty, pleasant-to-watch-when-she's-not-screeching Kathryn Grayson, the better. Her hymn to "Beauty" closes out the film, and it's hardly a winner. Esther Williams gets to show off her water skills, but it's all a bit so-so. A crazy bit is when Lucille Ball appears to be dominatrix to a bunch of cat women. Overall, it's hardly the great stuff you would expect from MGM