Sunday, January 12, 2020

Movie review - "Stolen Harmony" (1936) **

George Raft as an ex con who... plays the saxophone and can dance and joins a big band. Most of this is a musical... indeed more like a vaudeville show with lots of numbers performed by the band, led by Ben Bernie - not very well remembered now but a big name at the time. He's comfortable in front of the camera.

Raft has a romance and in the third act the gangsters come back into his life. The film awkwardly combines musical numbers and gangsters - act two is almost like a filmed concert, with lots of Ben Bernie and his band, and Raft doing a dance number on stage. Act three the gangsters come back - including Lloyd Nolan. The film is almost shot differently with different light focus and a very violent car chase and shoot out at the end. I wonder if this was added via reshoots. I could be wrong.

Someone called Grace Bradley is the female lead. Nolan is excellent. Raft is okay. It's not bad, not awful - lacks a little vim and vigour.

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