Director:
H. Bruce Humberstone Year: 1941 Rating:
5.5
What the world needs is to bring back the film genre of ice skating musicals.
It is dearly missed. By some I am sure. Yes, it was a real thing once upon
a time with Norwegian star Sonja Henie. Hard to imagine now all these years
later. She was a phenomenon that lasted about nine years but only ten films.
She could ice skate to perfection but could not sing or dance or in truth
act that well and yet she was one of the highest paid actors in Hollywood.
Her films were almost all hits. This though her male co-stars were not musical
stars - Tyrone Powers twice, John Payne twice, Don Ameche twice. Hard to
find an actor of course who could sing and ice skate so they didn't even
try. I think Sonja preferred it that way. She wanted the ice to herself.
She deserved it after winning the Gold medal for figure skating in 1928,
1932 and 1936 and pretty much every other competition there was during those
years.
After the 1936 Olympics in Berlin she went professional and formed a skating
show and after bringing it to Los Angeles she was signed up by Fox. Between
her shows and her films she was bringing in $2 million a year. She insisted
on choreographing the ice skating numbers and I doubt if anyone objected.
It is for reasons like this that I enjoy watching a lot of old films - for
things gone, times lost, memories barely preserved - films that would never
be made today. We have basically discarded the Western, the musical, noir
- all films of a time. But there was only one ice skating film star and that
was Sonja Henie. A genre unto herself. I have heard her name for years and
thought it was time to sit down and watch a film or two of hers. I don't
know about the rest of her films but this didn't exactly knock me out. A
silly story that is as believable as the tooth fairy. There is a lot of music
though which is good because the plot could not fill a thimble up.
The Marines have landed in Iceland and the country celebrates. Maybe. Iceland
actually was part of Denmark back then and when Denmark was taken over by
the Germans, Iceland declared neutrality. Then the British invaded Iceland
and handed it over to the USA to defend. They never had to and Iceland declared
its independence from Denmark. But in this version the city of Reykjavik
(which they make zero attempt to make the sets resemble) is thrilled, especially
the women. In the first musical number Joan Merrill and the Sammy Kaye Orchestra
sing I Like a Military Tune in which the lyrics basically say - women
of Iceland - get laid by the Americans - not quite like that but implied.
Murfin (John Payne) is a Marine and he clearly wants to get laid and chases
after the first girl he sees - Katina (Sonja) - and loads her up with old
lines of wanting to be a family man. She believes it and announces to her
family of her father (Felix Bressart), her sister (Osa Massen) and her now
ex-boyfriend (Sterling Holloway) that she is going to marry a Marine. Confusion
follows.
Sonja performs two big skating numbers - the last one a patriotic salute
to the Boys. A few songs from Sammy Kaye and Joan Merrill, a few laughs from
Jackie Oakie as the friend who can't get a girl and that is about it. It
is harmless. Painless. Sonja doesn't have much presence when not on skates
and Payne is an actor that just takes up handsome space for me. Still I want
to see another. It was wartime and this is what audiences wanted.
