Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		3.0
Overall		3.5

It's Always Fair Weather Blu-ray Movie Review

Forecast: Variable

Reviewed by Michael Reuben December 2, 2016

The Warner Archive Collection's latest addition to its Blu-ray musical catalog is MGM's 1955 It's Always Fair Weather, which began when writers Betty Comden and Adolph Green were inspired to create a stage sequel to their earlier hit, On the Town. But with the involvement of Gene Kelly, who had starred in the successful movie adaptation, the project shifted to the screen. Kelly recruited his previous directing partner, Stanley Donen, for what would turn out to be their final collaboration, but the studio was unwilling to hire Kelly's former co-stars, Jules Munshin (whom they considered no longer popular) and Frank Sinatra (who was deemed too expensive and too difficult). Ultimately they settled on Dan Dailey, an MGM contract player, and choreographer Michael Kidd, a veteran of the studio's most recent musical hit, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. For the film's female leads, they recruited Cyd Charisse, fresh off The Band Wagon and Brigadoon, and Broadway star Dolores Gray, in her feature singing debut.

Production of Fair Weather was buffeted by conflict: between Kelly and Donen, between producer Arthur Freed and a newly cost-conscious MGM, and, depending on who's telling the story, between Kelly and his male co-stars, who sometimes found their roles being reduced in favor of their director and leading man. The resulting film failed to connect with audiences and is frequently cited as the beginning of the end for MGM musicals.

Fair Weather remains a flawed creation, but its reputation has grown, because the parts that work are as good as anything MGM ever produced, and the cynical undercurrent that alienated audiences in 1955 is positively upbeat by today's standards. WAC has brought the film to Blu-ray with its usual care, despite some challenges that are further discussed in the "Video" section below.

It's October 1945, and three comrades-in-arms have just returned home from World War II. At Tim's Bar & Grill, their favorite New York hangout, Ted Riley (Kelly), Doug Hallerton (Dailey) and Angie Valentine (Kidd) swear that they'll always remain friends and make a pact to meet up in the same spot ten years from now. They seal the deal with a long night's dancing and drinking through town ("The Binge"), including a tap dance with trash can lids.

Ten years later, everything has changed. Valentine is a family man in Schenectady with a hamburger stand that he tries to dress up with the fancy name "Cordon Bleu". Hallerton has forsaken his artistic ambitions to become an ad executive, where high-pressure work has ruined both his stomach and his marriage. Riley, for whom everyone had the highest expectations, has devoted his intellect to womanizing, gambling and being a fight promoter with underworld connections. When the three meet up at the appointed time, they barely recognize each other. As they sit around a restaurant table in silence, each one sings to himself about how "I Shouldn't Have Come". It's typical of Fair Weather's irreverence that this morose lament is set to the soothing strains of "The Blue Danube Waltz".

By chance, the trio finds itself involved with Jackie Leighton (Charisse), a TV program coordinator for a show entitled Midnight with Madeline, which is sponsored by Klenzrite detergent, one of the biggest clients of Hallerton's agency. Riley quickly falls for this tough career woman who is his equal in intellect and his superior in achievement. (She also happens to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the boxing world, which comes in handy.) The other woman in the picture is Madeline Braville (Gray), the star of Midnight with Madeline, whose histrionics preemptively satirize every self-important game show and reality TV host who has followed. It's Jackie who has the bright idea of featuring the men's botched reunion on the show, which leads to all manner of machinations and deceptions. Complicating the picture is a brutal gangster named Culloran (Jay C. Flippen), who has fixed an upcoming bout involving Riley's latest boxer. When Riley contrives to "unfix" the fight, he ends up on the wrong side of the mob. Meanwhile, Valentine misses his family, and Hallerton gets drunk and regrets his life.

If all of this sounds busy and complicated, that's because it is. Despite an inexplicable Oscar nomination for its screenplay, Fair Weather's plot sprawls unevenly in all directions, and the film's best sequences typically occur in the gaps between rapid-fire exposition, when the music and choreography take over. Charisse's Jackie performs a gracefully athletic ballet with a gym full of boxers ("Baby You Knock Me Out"); Dailey's Hallerton skewers the group-think of his corporate colleagues ("Situation-Wise"); and Kelly's Riley tap dances down the street on roller skates, as his growing attraction for Jackie returns him to his one true love—himself ("I Like Myself"). Especially diverting, but entirely incidental to the plot, is the serio-comic rendition by Gray's Madeline of a detergent commercial set to the imposing strains of Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody ("Klenzrite"), which is followed by an elaboratedly choreographed number ("Thanks, But No Thanks") in which Madeline repels a bevy of suitors with gun, dynamite and trap doors. The film concludes with a brawl so artificially staged that it might as well be a dance number, ultimately leading to an emotional reconciliation among the three war buddies. As they go their separate ways in the early morning hours, however, no one is suggesting that they reconvene again in ten years.

Donen was reportedly not a fan of the Cinemascope format for musicals, but he brings a distinctive flair to its use in Fair Weather, utilizing split screen, rectangular superimpositions and strategically placed television monitors that expand the action (a standard device now but a novelty in 1955). Such directorial brio no doubt accounts for Fair Weather's favorable critical reception, even as audiences avoided it, and it's a big reason why the film has retained a devoted following among musical fanatics. (Damien Chazelle, writer/director of the forthcoming Oscar favorite La La Land, is reportedly a huge fan.)

It's Always Fair Weather Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

It's Always Fair Weather was shot by cinematographer Robert J. Bronner on the same problematic Eastmancolor stock that he would utilize two years later on Silk Stockings. For this 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray from the Warner Archive Collection, Warner's MPI facility has newly scanned a recent-vintage interpositive struck from the original camera negative. Meticulous color correction has virtually eliminated the deleterious effects of the "yellow layer collapse" discussed in the Silk Stockings review, but Fair Weather presents its own set of challenges. The film utilized numerous opticals for both its effects and the frequent dissolves, and cost-cutting by MGM resulted in less-than-optimal work. Even with MPI's best efforts, color and density waver noticeably during scene dissolves, and grain is accentuated during effects shots.

The most extreme example of corners being cut occurs during two shots that bookend the film, when the trio of ex-soldiers exits Tim's Bar & Grill into what is supposed to be the streets of New York but is really the MGM backlot. Superimposition and an optically engineered "zoom" were used to create the illusion of a cityscape behind the three men, but the effect is so poorly rendered that the previously crisp image degenerates into mush. It's the kind of egregious drop in quality that provokes internet buzzing about "upscaled DVD", but I have been assured by someone familiar with the source materials that these shots are just as bad in the original negative. (See screenshot 11 for an illustration.)

With these caveats noted, WAC's Blu-ray offers a vivid and surprisingly detailed image that does ample justice to Fair Weather's best sequences. Colors are rich and varied, especially in the dance performances featuring Cyd Charisse and Dolores Gray. Blacks are solid, densities are consistent (except during dissolves) and the film's grain pattern is remarkably tight and controlled, given the problematic stock. The limitations of early Cinemascope lenses can often be observed at the outer edges of the frame, where actors who appear portly in mid-frame are suddenly slim when they step to the side, thanks to the magic of anamorphic squeezing.

WAC has mastered Fair Weather at its usual high average bitrate, which clocks in here at just under 35 Mbps.

It's Always Fair Weather Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

It's Always Fair Weather was released to theaters in both mono and four-track stereo. The latter was used to create a 5.1 remix for the 2006 DVD, utilizing the original separate magnetic tracks. That mix now appears on Blu-ray encoded in lossless DTS-HD MA. The fidelity and dynamic range are exceptional for a film of this period, with vocals clearly rendered and a richly detailed orchestral presence arrayed across the front soundstage without hiss or distortion. Composer André Previn was nominated for an Oscar for his score, and the Blu-ray's track brings Previn's orchestrations into the home with clarity and authority. The rear channels are used primarily to expand the track's depth and presence.

It's Always Fair Weather Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The extras have been ported over from Warner's 2006 DVD release of It's Always Fair Weather. The trailer, outtakes and one of the cartoons have been remastered in 1080p.

• It's Always Fair Weather: Going Out on a High Note (480i; 1.78:1; 16:22): This 2006 Turner Entertainment production traces the film's history through interviews with Donen's biographer, Stephen M. Silverman, musical historian John Kendrick, Broadway directors Casey Nicholaw and Susan Stroman, and, in archival footage, writers Comden and Green, actors Michael Kidd and Cyd Charisse and composer André Previn.



• MGM Parade: Excerpt from Episode 1 with Cyd Charisse (480i; 1.33:1; 4:36): MGM Parade ran on ABC from 1955-1956. The show was initially hosted by George Murphy, who gushes over both Charisse and her upcoming film.



• MGM Parade: Excerpt from Episode 2 with Gene Kelly (480i; 1.33:1; 4:57): Murphy visits the set where Kelly and Charisse are rehearsing, but most of the segment is devoted to a preview of Kelly's roller skate ballet.



• Deputy Droopy (480i; 1.37:1; 6:35): Co-directed by Tex Avery, this MGM cartoon plays like an Old West variation on Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote, with Deputy Droopy repeatedly outwitting a pair of inept bandits.



• Good Will to Men (1080p; 2.35:1; 8:30): This remarkable 1955 cartoon was directed by the famous team of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera. It opens in the guise of a joyful Christmas story but quickly takes a dark turn reflecting the anxieties of the early atomic age.



• Outtakes: This collection of deleted musical numbers was reconstructed for the Fair Weather DVD from material found in the MGM archives. Note that the audio tracks are incomplete; the silent gaps are a limitation of the source and not a defect of the disc.


• Jack and the Space Giants (1080p; 2.56:1; 5:43): This was meant to be Michael Kidd's star turn, as Valentine performs wonders in the kitchen while telling his kids a story.


• Love Is Nothing but a Racket (1080p; 2.56:1; 6:40): As noted in the "Going Out on a High Note" featurette, Fair Weather lacks a dance duet between stars Charisse and Kelly, but one was indeed filmed. Set in the costume shop for Madeline's TV show, the choreography involves an array of quick changes, and the outfits end up upstaging the stars. Kelly reportedly hated the scene, and it's not surprising that it was cut.


• The Binge (1080p; 2.56:1; 5:05): These are unused takes from the film's opening number.


• I Thought They'd Never Leave (audio only) (2:31): This song would have been performed by Charisse's Jackie (who was dubbed by singer Carol Richards).



• Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 2.56:1; 3:13): The trailer labors mightily to create a meaningful link between the film's upbeat title and its frequently downbeat subject matter: "The forecast is for bright days ahead in this theater! Happiness for everyone!"

It's Always Fair Weather Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

If I could, I would condense Fair Weather into a highlight reel of favorite songs and routines. (The Blu-ray permits a variation of that approach, since the menu contains a song list marked by chapters.) For devotees of classic MGM musicals, the film is a must-own, but newcomers should proceed with caution. With due allowance for the limitations of the source, WAC's presentation is as good as they come.