Monday, April 18, 2011

Weekly Movie Review: Irene(1940)


*I'm going to try and review a movie or television show every week or every other week. I'm really trying my best, so keeping my fingers crossed. :)


With a free day off of work, I decided to catch up on my movies. One that I've been interested in seeing for some time, has been the 1940 film, "Irene" starring Anna Neagle and Ray Milland. I hadn't heard about the movie until it popped on TCM and that's when my interest peeked. Anna Neagle plays Irene O' Dare, a simple Irish girl who picks up odd jobs, when she meets the dashingly handsome Don Marshall(Milland). The two instantly hit it off, but Marshall's good friend, Bob Vincent(Alan Marshal) seems to fall under Irene's spell as well. Don keeps insisting he's not interested in Irene romantically, but moments away from Irene, Don knows he loves her. It's a fun and charming film, but there were some glitches for me.


1. What was up with the random singing and dancing bit??? It's not a musical, so why does Neagle's character, all of a sudden start singing in one single part, and then in another part, dances alone??? I don't know, but I found that quite odd.


2. The Wardrobe seemed to me, to be quite ordinary and plain. The females go all crazy over Irene's attire but it seems plain looking. I don't know, but I wasn't impressed by the looks.



3. Anna Neagles hairstyle really didn't work for her face, it should have been up more in my opinion.


Rating for the Film: B


So if you've seen this movie, what was your opinion on it and what did you think of the random bit of singing and dancing? Like or Dislike?


1 comment:

Grand Old Movies said...

Haven't seen this movie, but 'Irene' had originally been a popular musical on stage, and Anna Neagle was a big musical/movie star in Britain (though she does not seem to have have the same success in American movies) - From your description, it sounds as if the people making the movie of Irene couldn't make up their minds whether to keep it a musical and showcase Neagle's talents, or just play it straight, so they tried to go both ways! Doesn't sound like it was a good compromise.