Swing Time

Swing Time (1936)

a film by George Stevens

I liked Swing Time for what it is: a light-hearted comedy with outstanding dance sequences. This movie features the amazing dancing of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers who hover over the dance floor in some of the most beautiful sequences in the history of cinema but lack the narrative power and brilliant lines of Dancing In The Rain. When they stop dancing the movie stops glowing.

Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are amazing. The scene in the dance floor of the dancing academy is outstanding both because of their excellent performance as well as the camera movements which follow them without losing their moving interpretation. This sequence lingers in the history of cinema for its technical complexity but mostly because it is gripping to see this couple move with such grace and charm.

The downside of this movie was on every gap between dancing sequences. I had a hard time liking the character of Pop, I didn't believe the story and it was for me just a weak thread connecting the scenes where the dance and the music sparkle the movie with beauty and perfection.

This is a happy movie made in the hardest times and it is a spirit-warming film. With Astaire and Rogers one feels that dancing reaches perfection, that beauty is possible, that the such ease and grace make the world a better place.