A fairly clever story, but Astaire's persona and Gershwin's music go poorly with the aristocratic agrarian setting. Astaire plays an actor with a fabricated reputation as a lothario who falls for heiress Fontaine and persues her in her own castle, where she is "a prisoner" of her aunt. Burns and Allen are also jarring in the rarified atmosphere of a Wodehouse story; it sounds like they brought their own joke writers with them (because it's mostly bad puns like their radio show), and the effect is to diminish the quality of the film as a whole.
Some of the songs go on too long (the carnival sequence, though initially amusing, becomes annoying and seems to last a full reel) while others are given an unsuitable treatment and don't go on long enough (most notably the classic "Nice Work If You Can Get It" but also the well-done but seemingly amputated "A Foggy Day"). I used to wonder why Gershwin didn't win any Oscars that year for his wonderful score; now I wonder no longer. The producers seemingly went in a lot of cases with a more "realistic" approach, presenting the songs as they might have been done by vocal groups hired by the noblemen.... it might have been better if they had just thrown realism to the wind and done them in a full-on jazz style.
That said, the presentation of the song "Things are Looking Up" is quite nice, with Astaire dancing around Fontaine (to hide her inadequacy as a dance partner?) in a sylvan setting that is new for the performer. It was also refreshing to see him with a new consort, though it might have been a better choice to give him someone who could dance.
Some of the songs go on too long (the carnival sequence, though initially amusing, becomes annoying and seems to last a full reel) while others are given an unsuitable treatment and don't go on long enough (most notably the classic "Nice Work If You Can Get It" but also the well-done but seemingly amputated "A Foggy Day"). I used to wonder why Gershwin didn't win any Oscars that year for his wonderful score; now I wonder no longer. The producers seemingly went in a lot of cases with a more "realistic" approach, presenting the songs as they might have been done by vocal groups hired by the noblemen.... it might have been better if they had just thrown realism to the wind and done them in a full-on jazz style.
That said, the presentation of the song "Things are Looking Up" is quite nice, with Astaire dancing around Fontaine (to hide her inadequacy as a dance partner?) in a sylvan setting that is new for the performer. It was also refreshing to see him with a new consort, though it might have been a better choice to give him someone who could dance.