Blu-ray Review Ziegfeld Follies Blu-ray Review (1 Viewer)

[Matt Hough]

The Warner Archive Blu-ray release of Ziegfeld Follies offers the clarity and Technicolor brilliance that one has come to expect from their archive releases.



Ziegfeld Follies (1945)



Released: 08 Apr 1946
Rated: Approved
Runtime: 110 min




Director: Lemuel Ayers, Roy Del Ruth, Robert Lewis
Genre: Comedy, Musical



Cast: William Powell, Judy Garland, Lucille Ball
Writer(s): David Freedman, Hugh Martin, Ralph Blane



Plot: The late, great impresario Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. looks down from Heaven and ordains a new revue in his grand old style.



IMDB rating: 6.5
MetaScore: N/A





Disc Information



Studio: Warner Brothers
Distributed By: Warner Archive
Video Resolution: 1080P/AVC



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[Garysb]

Thanks for the review.
Here is the audio for "If Swing Goes I Go Too" which as you say was left off the extras for unknown reasons. Perhaps Fred Astaire's widow required Warner Bros. get a license from her to include it. This requirement has been a reason why clips of Fred Astaire have not been included in other projects such as the Kennedy Center Honors induction of Ginger Rogers and why some clips of Fred Astaire were removed from "When The Lion Roars" documentary when it was released on DVD .

 

[ArtAD]

So Happy and disappointed at the same time . Only a few audio outtakes that were on the Laserdisc are missing:
Leo the Lion speaks
If Swing goes I go too (Fred Astaire)
Here's to the Girls (also Fred Astaire)

I have the Rhino CD and some of the above outtakes are missing from the CD so happy they included these.

Happy they included the short featurette but it doe not discuss a lot of the deleted material that I would wanted them to (but you have the Hugh Fordin book)

Very disappointed in not including the alternate Puppet opening. For me it could have been unrestored and they could have charged more money for this Bluray (if money was the issue) & I would have paid it.

When I upgrade I am looking for more than just a restoration even though that is a big expense in itself. For some people it is just about the picture upgrade.

Now will I buy this.........yes....... for the added outtakes alone I would (now that my Laserdisc player is not working) and the additional picture upgrade is an added plus.

Also note I have purchased this serval times CED, VHS, Laserdisc (I think twice), and DVD so always looking for more.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

So Happy and disappointed at the same time . Only a few audio outtakes that were on the Laserdisc are missing:
Leo the Lion speaks)
Here's to the Girls (also Fred Astaire)

Those are both on the BD...

 

[Richard M S]

It's great to read that the film, for the most part, rises to the WarnerArchive standard, in particular Fred Astaire's numbers with Lucille Bremer which are my favorite.

 

[Richard M S]

As others have mentioned, it is regrettable that both the original all-Puppet opening and Astaire's "Swing" audio outtake were not included but I am curious about "Love" in Spanish, which is new, at least to me. Is it Lena Horne singing on the Spanish audio outtake or someone else?

 

[Colin Jacobson]

As others have mentioned, it is regrettable that both the original all-Puppet opening and Astaire's "Swing" audio outtake were not included but I am curious about "Love" in Spanish, which is new, at least to me. Is it Lena Horne singing on the Spanish audio outtake or someone else?

It's Horne...

 

[roxy1927]

What's up with Astaire's widow? I went years ago to Michael Feinstein's last salute to MGM at Carnegie Hall and she was there and spoke. Why in the world would she have kept clips with him from being shown at Rogers' Kennedy Center salute?

 

[Matt Hough]

Thanks for the review.
Here is the audio for "If Swing Goes I Go Too" which as you say was left off the extras for unknown reasons. Perhaps Fred Astaire's widow required Warner Bros. get a license from her to include it. This requirement has been a reason why clips of Fred Astaire have not been included in other projects such as the Kennedy Center Honors induction of Ginger Rogers and why some clips of Fred Astaire were removed from "When The Lion Roars" documentary when it was released on DVD .

Thanks for including that link to the song in this review thread. Now folks who didn't know what I was talking about in the review can hear it for themselves.

 

[Garysb]

What's up with Astaire's widow? I went years ago to Michael Feinstein's last salute to MGM at Carnegie Hall and she was there and spoke. Why in the world would she have kept clips with him from being shown at Rogers' Kennedy Center salute?

She wanted to be paid a license fee for the use of his image. The Kennedy Center had never paid for the use of clips, they were always donated. The Kennedy Center did not want to start a precedent. I don't believe the amount requested was exorbitated. It was more about the estate protecting the rights to his image so others wouldn't exploit it. Though she did sell his image for use in a commercial for a vacuum cleaner . The commercial showed Fred Astaire dancing with a Dirt Devil.

Fred Astaire dances with vacuums in commercials set for Super Bowl debut

NEW YORK (AP) _ Fred Astaire set the standard for elegance and style in Hollywood musicals. A decade after his death, he will turn up toting vacuum cleaners in Super Bowl commercials that use some of his best-known filmed dance routines. Robyn Astaire said she agreed to give the makers of...

apnews.com

 

[roxy1927]

I wonder how Astaire's kids felt about this.
If he had invested his money well from his long successful career he must have left a lot of money. But then maybe not if she had him selling vacuum cleaners.

 

[Joel Arndt]

I received my copy yesterday and was only going to watch up until the Esther Williams sequence. Well, I ended up watching the whole thing and enjoyed it even more than I expected. It's another beauty from WAC and may not be 100% perfect in certain spots as Mr. Harris pointed out, but overall a huge improvement over the DVD release. Oh, and the details in the Limehouse Blues sequence. When the lights come on in the big set before the fan dance with Astaire and Bremer. Amazing! Highly recommended if you enjoy musicals from the 40s and MGM musicals especially.

 

[Will Krupp]

overall a huge improvement over the DVD release.

I agree, it's an enormous improvement over the DVD!

 

[roxy1927]

Yes it is quite wonderful. I've watched the Astaire/Bremer sequences a couple of times. And of course I've already watched them numerous times before. I'm so astounded by the talents that once existed. Minnelli, Sharaff, Irene, Salinger, Thompson, Duquette. But oh my lord those comedy sketches...
And yet they cut out Liza and If Swing Goes. The whole thing could have been musical numbers.
Bremer is never listed among Astaire's great partners and yet she certainly is one. How did once upon a time women who they used to call raving beauties have so much talent?

 

[Conrad_SSS]

Mine arrived yesterday as well.....I never imagined I would see this film look so amazingly beautiful. The presentation is stunning. I never cared for any of the sketches, and laserdisc gave me the first opportunity to simply skip past them. The musical numbers are really astounding, and I'd have to say that I got chills watching LIMEHOUSE BLUES. The stereophonic track seems to have been punched up a bit more here and there, and it is a magnificent release. Warner Archive's achievements with the Technicolor films (not to say almost everything else they've released in the last year or so) have been amazing.

 

[Will Krupp]

laserdisc gave me the first opportunity to simply skip past them. The musical numbers are really astounding

I would agree that MOST of the musical numbers are astounding (in one way or another) but I, too, am used to zipping right through the movie and skipping over the stuff I don't care for. This is the first time in a long time that I watched all of it all the way through and I must admit it's going to be a long time before I do it again.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. This is one movie where the whole is a lot less than the sum of its parts. Some of those parts, however, are wonderful.

 

[Joel Arndt]

The musical numbers are really astounding, and I'd have to say that I got chills watching LIMEHOUSE BLUES.

Same here. The orchestration and the reveal of that huge set never fails to send chills up my spine.

 

[Daniel_BB]

I bought the laserdisc, the DVD and now the blu-ray just for two musical numbers: This Heart of Mine and Limehouse Blues. My opinion is that Lucille Bremer was absolutely a top class dancer and she deserved far more recognition. I just hope that Warner Archive will release in the future another favourite of mine, "Yolanda and the Thief" also starring Miss Bremer and Fred Astaire. About Limehouse Blues, Mister Conrad Salinger was able to transform this simple song into a fully fledged orchestral ballet and it seems that the connoisseurs of the musical world of M-G-M appreciate it very much ...

 

[Daniel_BB]

George Murphy, Vincente Minnelli, Fred Astaire, Arthur Freed, and Lucille Bremer welcome gossip columnist Louella Parsons to the set of Ziegfeld Follies. Astaire and Bremer are in costume for the extraordinary “Limehouse Blues” sequence.

 

[AnthonyClarke]

such a shame the movie as a whole just didn't match the quality of the few wonderful bits, especially those including Fred. Even the Judy Garland entry leaves me cold, compared to the thrills she usually delivers. Ah well, a canape is a feast to a starving man.