Meet the People
 
   

Director: Charles Reisner
Year:  1944
Rating: 6.0


Back in the days when musicals were a top part of the film landscape, there was still a division between the A musical unit and lesser low budget ones. Even though this one has a solid cast, it clearly falls into the latter category. The main problem is that the songs for the most part are just not all that good - though they get stronger towards the end of the film. But till then they are a bunch of one-off novelty numbers - some that fall quite flat.



Made during WW II, this has a propaganda angle to it giving kudos towards the men and women who made our ships of war. This particular group of workers just happen to have a fair amount of musical talent with the likes of Dick Powell, Bert Lahr (The Cowardly Lion), Virginia O'Brien, Spike Jones and June Allyson. A Hollywood star played by Lucille Ball comes to the dockyard to promote war bonds and falls for a gruff man of the people worker. Hey, it's a musical. What did you expect.



This was an interesting period for Dick Powell as he was making the transition from "juvenile" music star in a bunch of Busby Berkeley films like 42nd Street and some of the Gold Digger films to a rougher more mature persona that was soon to culminate in the same year as this one in his portrayal of Marlowe in the terrific Murder, My Sweet.  June Allyson on the other hand was just at the  beginning of her career and has one musical number in this film that is decent. She and Powell were to be married the next year that was to last till Powell died in 1963. Another intriguing actress is Virginia O'Brien who became a popular novelty singer in many films and had the nicknames of Frozen Face, Miss Deadpan and Miss Ice Glacier for her manner of delivering a song. Here she gets the best song in the film with Say That We'll Be Sweethearts Again - an amusing and impossible to sing today - love ode to an ex-boyfriend who abused her and tried to kill her.