On the Town (1949)

 Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly's "On the Town"


Watching Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly's 1949 technicolor musical "On the Town" gave me the sense that I was watching what Hollywood would become over the next decade. At the peak of the noir age, American cinema was entering the new 1950s technicolor visual extravaganza, which included both musicals and westerns alike. "On the Town," based on the 1944 stage musical of the same name, centers on a group of U.S. Navy sailors who are allotted 24 hours in New York City to sightsee. During their journey throughout the city, they come across three women who join them, one of them being "Miss Turnstiles," whom the Gene Kelly character attempts to locate time and time again throughout the film. 

Although the wonderful "Singin' in the Rain" signaled the greatness that would be achieved by Donen and Kelly, "On the Town" seems to act as a prototype to this aesthetic of musical. While I feel that the former is an untouchable masterpiece, the latter doesn't necessarily peak my interest in the same way. 



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