Film as art

Film as Art
For a film to transcend from its classification, as a film to a work of art is tenuous process that often uses time as its judge. Does the message of the film hold up, are the characters still relevant, how well written is the story, etc. For me, one film that lives up to those factors is the Gene Kelly classic Singin in the Rain. Singing in the Rain is the story of the classic Hollywood film that tells the story of the industry’s transition from silent films to talkies. The people concerned by this the most are the silent film stars, namely leading man Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly), his sidekick Cosmo Brown (Donald O’ Connor in a stellar performance) and Lockwood’s leading lady, Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen). As mentioned before, the conceit of the film is the conflict between Lina’s transition from silent to talkies, due in part to her squeaky voice. To combat this, Lina enlists Don’s budding love interest, Katy (Debbie Reynolds) to dub her in the moving picture. From there, people clash, dance, argue and sing. Oh how they sing.
Metatextuality is now common place in the entertainment today, shows like 30 Rock and Community frequently reference films and television shows within their programs, sometimes even lifting tropes from a genre and milking it for a whole episode. While Singin in the Rain doesn’t necessarily reference specific Hollywood films, the film instead pokes fun at the overacting of the silent often to great comic effect. Also, Singing in the Rain holds the distinction of being a jukebox musical, for which the film does not have any original songs; rather it uses preexisting songs during its musical sequences. Even the titular Singin in the Rain, did not originate from this film; the film that holds that distinction is The Hollywood Music Box Revue, circa 1929. However, one of my favorite songs, from the film, also holds the distinction of being in one my favorite scenes in from the film. That would be O’Connor’s Make Em laugh, which holds the distinction of being the lone original song from the film (but don’t let Cole Porter hear you say that).
The scene in question has O’Connor describing his love for comedy. OF which he dictates that his main goal in Hollywood is to “Make me laugh”. O’Connor’s physicality as a dancer is impressive and his athletics don’t slouch either. Aside from traditional dancing, O’Connor shakes, flips, stumbles, hops up and down, pantomimes a date, and my personal favorite, runs up the fake wall of a Hollywood set. Granted he lip-synched his song, but regardless, his performance hides this fact and makes you truly believe this man is singing and dancing at the same time. O’Connor was an entertainer true and true and he took it all the way to the hospital. Literally, he was hospitalized after filming because his cigarette habit killed his stamina. But to go back on point, this scene stands as my favorite because of the purity of it. An entertainer is in his element, he’s happy and he does not want to do anything else but make people happy. For me, that is true pure, jubilance right there.
All in all, Singin in the rain has been and will always will be, one of my favorite films. From the song and dance numbers, the sharp script, beautiful cinematography, it is pure cinema right there.