While overlong and not quite as good as it could have been, George Roy Hill’s Thoroughly Modern Millie is still a frisky lark of a comic musical.
The Production: 3.5/5
When uber-producer Ross Hunter decided he wanted to make a musical with the nation’s number one box-office star Julie Andrews, he hit on the notion of producing a movie of The Boy Friend, the 1920s musical spoof which had brought Julie to America and introduced her to great acclaim on Broadway. But MGM owned the rights to the play and wasn’t interested in selling them to Hunter and Universal. It was probably for the best. Julie was too old by then to recreate her original role of Polly Browne, but Hunter pushed ahead with his own spoof of the 1920s titled Thoroughly Modern Millie, a sweetly cartoonish comedy with music employing paeans to the flapper decade while retaining a more winking take on the era as a whole. Hunter’s gamble paid off: the film was a smash hit and ranked as the highest grossing movie in Universal’s history until Airport came along three years later.
Ready to conquer the Big Apple with her new bobbed haircut, snazzy short dresses, and a live-for-today attitude, Millie DIllmount (Julie Andrews) makes the acquaintance of innocent little rich girl Miss Dorothy Brown (Mary Tyler Moore), and both young ladies go looking for careers and hopefully husbands. Little do they know, however, that the proprietress of their Priscilla Hotel for Single Ladies is the scheming Mrs. Meers (Beatrice Lillie) who kidnaps family-less girls and sells them to a white slavery ring. Millie’s boss is the gorgeous Trevor Graydon (John Gavin) who flips for Miss Dorothy instead of her whom he can only see as a Johnny-on-the-spot secretary. Good sport Millie falls back on a fun-loving pal Jimmy Smith (James Fox) who seems to like her, but Millie isn’t convinced he’s not after Miss Dorothy (or at least her money), too, since he doesn’t seem interested in working. Between keeping Jimmy on the straight and narrow and evading Mrs. Meers’ nasty clutches, Millie has her hands more than full.
The screenplay by Richard Morris is pretty simplistic and can’t really support a musical-comedy that runs two-and-a-half hours. There are some funny running gags: the cranky hotel elevator that requires its occupants to dance their way to the floor of their choice, Mrs. Meers’ repeated attempts to dope Miss Dorothy to sell to the slavery ring, and the out-of-this-world escapades of the dizzy heiress Muzzy Van Hossmere (Carol Channing), but the entire enterprise seems padded today and could easily have run one hundred minutes with no ill effects (but not at roadshow prices, of course). Director George Roy Hill enhances the fun by employing a number of 1920s’ movie tropes: Millie’s breaking the fourth wall and commenting to the audience in a series of intertitles, the use of wipes and iris ins and outs between scenes, a tribute to Harold Lloyd’s Safety Last in the film’s second half, and a score utilizing much music of the period (“Stumbling,” “Japanese Sandman”), sometimes sung by Julie Andrews in voiceover: “Baby Face” as she flips for her new boss, “Poor Butterfly” as she heartbreakingly realizes she’s lost Graydon to Miss Dorothy, and the title tune (written expressly for the film by Jimmy Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn) as Millie goes through a striking transformation from Kansas farm girl to Jazz Age flapper right before our eyes. His buoyant direction hits a snag, however, late in the film when fireworks and mad chase don’t sustain laughs or suspense, and the thwarting of the crooks seems to take forever. There are two production numbers: the effervescent dance sequence “The Tapioca” (music by Jay Thompson) and the lengthy and less necessary “Jewish Wedding Song,” another sequence that could have been completely eliminated from the film to no ill effect.
Julie Andrews may be playing a Kansas farmgirl, but she doesn’t even attempt to hide her British accent. When she warbles the melting “Jimmy,” however, all is forgiven, and her pluck and hearty camaraderie sell the character beautifully. James Fox, a fellow Brit, does a much better job hiding his origins as paper clip salesman Jimmy Smith (with a few secrets of his own) even if he is dubbed in his one song by Jimmy Bryant. He and Julie make a fine comic couple. Carol Channing walks away with the movie as the firecracker heiress Muzzy Van Hossmere earning both a Golden Globe award and an Oscar nomination for her work. She takes her two musical spots, a giving rendition of “Jazz Baby” and an acrobatic turn in “Do It Again,” and brings down the house with both. In her first film after her huge success on television on The Dick Van Dyke Show, Mary Tyler Moore has little to do (apart from some nifty elevator dancing with Julie to the song “Stumbling”) as the one-note innocent Miss Dorothy Brown. John Gavin is a likewise 8X10 glossy as stuffy boss Trevor Graydon. Legendary comedienne Beatrice Lillie seems to have a load of fun with her crafty Mrs. Meers assisted by a very young Pat Morita and Jack Soo. Cavada Humphrey has some funny running gag moments as stern office manager Miss Flannery, and Herbie Faye earns some laughs, too, as a prickly cabbie.
Video: 5/5
3D Rating: NA
The film has been framed at its theatrical aspect ratio of 1.85:1, and its 1080p resolution is encoded using AVC. Sharpness and color reproduction are the most obvious improvements from the DVD release, and the film’s grain structure is now much more astutely resolved in this high definition transfer. There are no instances of dirt, dust, splices, or tears to be seen. The movie has been divided into 11 chapters.
Audio: 5/5
The DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 stereo sound mix does a very fine job spreading the music and effects across the front soundstage. Dialogue and song lyrics are clearly rooted to the center speaker. There are no problems with hiss, pops, crackle, or flutter. This being the roadshow edition of the film, the overture, the entr’acte (a medley of Julie’s solos in the film), and the exit music are provided.
Special Features: 2/5
Audio Commentary: the track is provided by film historians Lee Gambin and Ian McAnally. They have a lively conversation about the movie attempting to comment on the lengthy film as it runs, but by the second hour, Gambin begins reading lengthy passages from Andrews’ memoir Home Work and the reference book Road Show to fill in the time.
Theatrical Trailers: (2:39, HD, 2:35, SD), both advertising the regular engagements for the film after its roadshow release.
Kino Trailers: What’s So Bad About Feeling Good? Daddy Long Legs, Never Steal Anything Small, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Sweet Charity.
Overall: 3.5/5
While overlong and not quite as good as it could have been, George Roy Hill’s Thoroughly Modern Millie is still a frisky lark of a comic musical. This newly remastered transfer provided by Universal and released by Kino Lorber is sure to please fans of the stars and the musical genre.
Thoroughly Modern Millie (Special Roadshow Edition…
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Matt has been reviewing films and television professionally since 1974 and has been a member of Home Theater Forum’s reviewing staff since 2007, his reviews now numbering close to three thousand. During those years, he has also been a junior and senior high school English teacher earning numerous entries into Who’s Who Among America’s Educators and spent many years treading the community theater boards as an actor in everything from Agatha Christie mysteries to Stephen Sondheim musicals.
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