Discount Shopping Online :: DVD The Gang's All Here : : Busby Berkeley

The Gang's All Here
starring: Alice Faye, Carmen Miranda, Phil Baker, Benny Goodman, Benny Goodman Orchestra
directed by: Busby Berkeley

List Price: $19.98

Amazon.com's Price: $17.99

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Used Price: $10.31
Collectible Price: $29.99
Third Party New Price: $8.08

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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: Unrated
Binding: DVD
Brand: TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX HOME ENT
EAN: 0024543403678
Format: Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Full Screen, NTSC
Label: 20th Century Fox
Manufacturer: 20th Century Fox
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: 20th Century Fox
Region Code: 1
Release Date: February 20, 2007
Running Time: 103 minutes
Sales Rank: 68600
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Theatrical Release Date: December 24, 1943

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Editorial Review:

Description:
Her girl-next-door looks combined with a sultry singing voice made Alice Faye one of Hollywood's biggest stars in the Golden Age of Cinema.

Eadie Allen (Alice Faye) is a chorus girl who dreams of becoming a star. While working at a New York nightclub, she meets Sergeant Andy Mason (James Ellison); they fall in love but he is shipped off to war. As Eadie becomes the headliner at the nightclub, Andy comes home a war hero. But complications arise when Eadie finds out Andy is unofficially engaged to another woman. It's up to Eadie's friend and nightclub co-star Dorita (Carmen Miranda) to set things straight. The Gang's All Here is filled with leggy chorus dancers and lavish musical production numbers including Faye's flashy neon finale 'The Polka Dot Polka.'

Amazon.com:
Here's one of Hollywood's great excursions into surrealism: The Gang's All Here, the legendarily over-the-top wartime musical. Director Busby Berkeley threw every demented idea that every swirled out of his teeming brain into this madcap affair, and decades later the film was still wowing 'em as a campy jaw-dropper.

The plot is the nonsensical stuff of homefront musicals, with chorus girl Alice Faye waiting for soldier boy James Ellison to return from the war, little knowing he is engaged to another woman. But the real point here is the crazy production design and the flabbergasting numbers--most famously, Carmen Miranda's 'The Lady in the Tutti-Frutti Hat,' which includes a chorus line of women dancing while holding giant bananas over their heads. It might have been dreamed up by Salvador Dali after an acid trip. Alice gets her due with the equally crazy 'Polka-Dot Polka,' and Benny Goodman and his orchestra are also around. So are such reliable second bananas (you should excuse the expression) as Edward Everett Horton and high-kicking Charlotte Greenwood.

The DVD extras include a 20-minute documentary on Berkeley's peculiar art, plus a charming 25-promotional film featuring Alice Faye reminiscing about her old pictures and extolling the virtues of physical fitness (made for the Pfizer drug company while Faye was their spokesperson). A deleted comedy scene and two episodes from the long-running radio show Faye did with husband Phil Harris are also included. The print itself is a source of controversy; the colors lack the 'pop' of the original Technicolor, and the film looks dimmer and vaguer than its original glory. Here's hoping a cleaner, fuller version will emerge. --Robert Horton

Customer Reviews

Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- Busby Berkeleys' last big hurrah! Not to be missed.
This 1943 colour film is in my mind memorable for many things,the least of which is this being Berkeley's last film in which he had the free hand to create that which was lacking for a few years previously and for those remaining years therafter.
As with his later Warner years and his ensuing MGM years his talent would be saddled with studio control and tight budgets.This loan out to 20th Century Fox and a reuniting with Darryl Zanuck proved to be a God send for him and film history.He was given free reign again and he made the most of this technicolour beauty.
The plot is the usual war time fluff.Boy meets girl,boy loses girl only to get her back in the end with the usual ensuing plot twists and turns.War sentiment is the strong message here as Alice Faye sings longingly about her man gone off to war and being loyal with a version of Ella Mae Morses' then current hit "No Nothin'".
Of course the ... Read More

Rating:

- Fast forward to the GREAT parts!
The plot is silly. Really, really silly and trite.

However, this pointless fluff was put into the hands of the one-of-a-kind Busby Berkeley. He added swarms of dancing show girls gracefully groaning under the weight of giant bananas and the always amazing Alice Faye singing as only she can.

The recurring theme of large fruit comes back again when Carmen Miranda dances with an enormously huge Tutti Fruitti Hat -- an image that has lived on for generations on stage, screen, cartoons and I Love Lucy episodes.

If you need a break from the tedium of reality, this is the DVD for you! You just gotta love it.

Rating:

- The gang's not quite all here.
First, be aware that the reviews included may refer to either the 2007 or 2008 DVD releases. I have no complaints about the 2008 release. The colors are vibrant and images very clear. In addition to the feature film, Dr. Drew Casper hosts a commentary version in which he points out technical details of the production making and comments on some of the personnel. "We Still Are" is a brief nostalgic trip by an older Alice Faye, mostly of interest for a few highlight clips of some of her earlier films. I didn't think the Busby Berkeley documentary was worth a look. I've seen a much better one somewhere else.
Back to the point of my title, where's John Payne, Don Ameche, Cesar Romero and/or Betty Grable? We got used to the presence of at least a couple of these stars in the Fox musicals of the early '40s, along with Alice Faye and/or Carmen Miranda, who star in this film. Perhaps this oversight was intentional, ... Read More

Rating:

- Don't bother with the plot. Fast forward to the bananas and "No Love, No Nothin'"
The only problem with The Gangs All Here is the plot. It keeps getting in the way of the production numbers. Busby Berkeley manages to shoehorn four major numbers in just the first 30 minutes, and he doesn't let up much after that. These numbers include everything Busby Berkeley could think of, from Benny Goodman swinging "Minnie's in the Money" to Alice Faye singing "No Love, No Nothin'" to some bizarre extravaganzas featuring lots of thighs, bananas and Carmen Miranda. You'll want to hit the fast forward button at regular intervals to get past the dull parts between them. The story is corny, the romantic misunderstanding is...yawn... and the acting is often weak (James Ellison as the male lead) or prissily unfunny (Edward Everett Horton). Still, the Technicolor is as garish as you could want and the songs by Harry Warren and Leo Robin work well. There's little time to think of anything except the numbers and what Berkeley ... Read More

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