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TechnoTV - The Sky's the Limit
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List Price: $14.98
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Your Save: $ 14.98 ( 100% )
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Manufacturer: Turner Home Ent
Starring: Fred Astaire, Joan Leslie, Robert Benchley, Robert Ryan, Elizabeth Patterson
Directed By: Edward H. Griffith
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9786301328173
Format: Black & White
ISBN: 1559603860
Label: Turner Home Ent
Manufacturer: Turner Home Ent
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Turner Home Ent
Release Date: 1999-05-04
Running Time: 89
Studio: Turner Home Ent
Theatrical Release Date: 1943-07-13
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: "So, set 'em up, Joe. I've got a little story you oughta know."
Comment: With Fred Astaire's most lauded works being readily available to the public, I've always thought it a great treat to stumble into his lesser known, harder-to-find films. THE SKY'S THE LIMIT qualifies as such, and it's a darn good movie. Here, Astaire has a more dramatic role than usual and he proves to be capable in it. Meanwhile, there's the usual excellent dancing and the showcasing of two great song standards.
Fred plays Fred Atwell, an ace pilot of the world famous Flying Tigers. After another successful mission, the Tigers are sent on a stateside promotional tour, but Fred, wanting to get away from it all for a bit, decides to skip out and have fun on his own. He ends up in a New York nightclub and meets fledgeling magazine photographer Joan Manion (Joan Leslie), whom he rapidly rubs the wrong way. Not wishing to be bombarded with questions re the Flying Tigers, he presents himself as a carefree, out-of-work fella named Fred Burton. Fred goes on the chase and eventually wins Joan over. But it doesn't take long before she begins to question Fred's casual work ethic and seemingly aimless nature (as set in the WW2 backdrop, these are especially frowned on qualities). Things get even more thorny when his casual fling turns serious as Fred, knowing that he's only on a short leave and must soon depart, finds himself falling hard for Joan.
THE SKY'S THE LIMIT, released in 1943, isn't one of Fred Astaire's best when compared to his many classic pictures. But when viewed strictly on its own merit, it becomes a more accomplished work. Part of the reason that this film didn't perform as well as hoped in the box office was that it was promoted strictly as a lighthearted musical-comedy. The depth and dark undercurrent must've come as a surprise to the viewers back then. This film was made in the throes of WW2 and presented a departure from the normally happy and bouncy Fred Astaire product. Here, Fred gets a chance to do some acting and acquits himself well with his more callous and bleaker-than-norm character. Too, the love story starts out light and frivolous but then rapidly evolves into a bittersweet, whirlwind romance, which must've struck close to home with the wartime viewers.
Although the general feel of the film is one of lighthearted comedy, one can never fully forget that the froth takes place during the wartime backdrop. The presence of World War 2 is a constant quiet intrusion, affecting everything that goes on in the film. There's a sense of urgency implied in Fred's antics as he's perfectly (and maybe even desperately) aware of the limited time he has to seek out his fun. To him and most of the soldiers on leave, money is nothing while making the most of your alloted time is everything. It gives this film an added resonance.
Songwriter Johnny Mercer contributes two great songs: the wartime ballad "My Shining Hour" and the wistful lament "One For My Baby." There's also his "A Lot in Common With You" but that tune's merely decent, even if the lyrics are clever. Proving again that he's as graceful a singer as he is a hoofer, Fred delivers an easy going spoofy rendition of "My Shining Hour." His singing of "One For My Baby," on the other hand, is anything but easy going. His enraged and drunken performance of "One For My Baby" is the hands down showstopper of the film. It's a virtuoso act as Fred kick-shatters real glass and dances with vivid emotional rawness. Meanwhile, his ballroom dance with Leslie to "My Shining Hour" is typically elegant. Now, Fred isn't classically handsome, by any means (with his elongated face, he looks more like Mr. Peanut). More often than not, in his films, he wears down the girl with his good-natured but dogged pursuit. Short, lean, and balding, he relies on his cosmopolitan charisma and dancing feet to win the girl. Accordingly, it's his unwelcome, oneupmanship duet with Joan in "A Lot In Common With You" which makes her grudgingly begin to reciprocate his feelings. It's in this number that names of Astaire and Leslie's past film partners are tongue-in-cheeked invoked. Good fun.
I've always liked Joan Leslie (never better than in Yankee Doodle Dandy (Two-Disc Special Edition)). She's wholesomely lovely, down to earth, and can hold her own in the song & dance department. She reminds me of Debbie Reynolds, but not as cheeky. For a while in her career, she played opposite male leads much older than she. She was 16 when she played 40-year-old Gary Cooper's love interest in Sergeant York (Two-Disc Special Edition). Here, Joan was 18 (although made up to look older), Fred was 44. But never mind. They're both good in their roles and convincing and heartbreaking as a couple in love. Robert Benchley is a welcome addition as the funny and cynical magazine editor who attempts to be Fred's rival for Joan. Don't miss his bemused bargraph/chart lecture; it's a howl. A young Robert Ryan also briefly shows up as Fred's kinda cruel but steadfast Flying Tiger pal.
No, THE SKY'S THE LIMIT will never be mistaken for The Best Years of Our Lives. But, beneath the bubbly facade, the film does attempt to depict the day-to-day goings-on of life in the wartime era (and this was even before the U.S. officially joined WW2). As such, there's a hefty undercurrent of somberness and of events in unpredictable flux which makes this film even more relevant as we simultaneously enjoy it as a giddy Astaire vehicle. Unlike most of Astaire's films, which tout a blithely happy ending, this one ends on a bittersweet note. As Fred and a tearful Joan part ways and as he returns to his perilous job, uncertainty clouds the air. I can't help but wonder if Fred made it thru okay and met up with his Joan again. But we'll never know.
Note: other Fred Astaire gems which aren't widely heralded but shouldn't be forgotten: Second Chorus, Damsel in Distress (with Joan Fontaine & Burns and Allen, VHS), Three Little Words (awesome movie!), and THE PLEASURE OF HIS COMPANY (although he doesn't really dance in this one). Even The Belle of New York (The Musicals Great Musicals Collection) and Yolanda & The Thief (both VHS), which aren't as entertaining, are still passable fare. I'm biased, though, because I consider Fred Astaire to be the best dancer in film EVER, a class act, and one of my all-time favorites in cinema. So, in my eyes, every picture he was ever in, however modest, is just cause for trumpeting.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Not Much Song and Dance
Comment:
Although "The Sky's the Limit" (1943) was a MGM film, the budget for production design was on the level of a Republic B-Western. This makes this black and white film noteworthy for production design buffs as they can pick apart each set and the many surprisingly obvious (for MGM) sound stage background projections. The low budget also required the use of stock footage, a technique that the MGM editors (used to working on high quality productions) were probably out-of-practice employing.
As already pointed out, the most glaring example is the aerial combat scene that opens the movie. Fred Atwell (Fred Astaire) is shown in an obvious WWII P-40 cockpit mock-up (Ed Wood quality). Even worse the editors cut in footage from a WWI biplane dogfight. Fred Astaire and Joan Leslie (who plays his love interest) were 44 and 18 respectively when the film was produced. This kind of shoots down the overall credibility of their romance. Imagine an 18 year-old girl waking up to find a strange 44 year-old man in her kitchen. But they glam up Leslie so much that she looks a bit older. For anyone unfamiliar with Astaire he was hardly leading man material but was quite a featured dancer. He looked about 60 when he was 30 and not much older when he made "Finian's Rainbow" in 1968 at the age of 69.
Some things to watch for are the neon lights on the instruments of the nightclub orchestra and the self-reflexive reference to Ginger Rogers (Astaire's usual co-star). There are a couple of good song and dance numbers although "The Sky's the Limit" could not really be considered a musical. Although the film itself is obscure, Astaire's dance number in the hotel bar is often referenced in discussions of musicals. Utilizing a marble floor, mirrors, and shelves of glasses he does an amazing multi-tempo dance routine, which climaxes in a frenzy of broken glass.
Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.
Customer Rating:
Summary: "One for My Baby"...A great song, a great dance and a great dancer. Hard to beat Fred Astaire, Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer
Comment: One great dance number by Fred Astaire and two great Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer songs redeem this minor Astaire movie. The Sky's the Limit tells the story of Fred Atwell (Fred Astaire), a Flying Tiger ace pilot, brought home to make special public appearances with other aces before returning to the war. But he decides to take a few days unofficial leave, jumps off his train and makes his way to New York. There he happens to see Joan Manion (Joan Leslie), an ace photographer, sitting at the bar of the Cosmopolitan Club with her boss, magazine owner Phil Harriman (Robert Benchley). It may not be love at first sight, exactly, but a combination of vivid attraction with a smattering of lust. Atwell pursues her relentlessly, even finding a place to stay in her rooming house, until she relents. She's attracted to him, but his story of not being interested in work bothers her. After all, everyone should be working to help the war effort. He's keeping the fact that he's an ace fighter pilot a secret. Since he has only five days before he must rejoin his group and return to the Pacific, he's got to cut corners and work fast. But complications arise. The "I don't like to work" line blows up in his face; she thinks he's a war-time dead beat; he doesn't want to tell her the truth and that he's in love. He knows he must leave her because he has to go back to the fighting. But wouldn't you know...her boss, who loves her, too...sets things up so that Joan learns the truth, and just in time for them both to declare their love. We leave them with Fred's plane climbing the sky toward Australia, and Joan looking skyward after him with a prayer for his safety.
This is a Fred Astaire movie?
Actually, it's a wartime morale booster that stars Astaire. I'm sure the audiences back in 1943 left the movie houses having enjoyed themselves, but with a feeling of poignant hope about the dedication and sacrifice the war effort is calling for. Sixty years later, however, what are we left with? Not much, but what there is is choice.
The movie only has three songs, but two are classics and one is lot of fun. "One for My Baby," sung and danced by Astaire, is a great bluesy moan of unhappiness and frustration. "My Shining Hour," sung first by Leslie, then by Astaire, then later danced by Astaire and Leslie, is a lovely song of hope and delicate optimism, with the lyric and melody perfectly matched:
This will be my shining hour
Calm and happy and bright.
In my dreams, your face will flower
Through the darkness of the night.
Like the lights of home before me
Or an angel, watching o'er me,
This will be my shining hour
'Til I'm with you again
A little later, walking Joan Manion home, Fred says he thinks the song should be a bit more lighthearted, and proceeds to sing his version...
This will be my shining hour,
Lonely though it may be.
Like the face of Misha Auer
On the music hall marquee.
Were they stingers or bacardis?
Was it Tony's, was it Sardi's?
This will be my shining hour
'Til I'm with you again.
Even later, Astaire and Leslie dance a romantic declaration of love to the melody.
"I've Got a Lot in Common With You" is a clever, fast-paced song and dance routine by Astaire and Leslie at a USO club. The song features a funny in-joke by Mercer that works in a reference by Joan Leslie to Jimmy Cagney and one by Astaire to Rita Hayworth. Leslie had just finished Yankee Doodle Dandy and Astaire, You Were Never Lovelier. The fast tap routine shows just how good Astaire was at working with actresses who had limited dancing experience. Look carefully and you'll see that Leslie's most demanding moves are frequently disguised by Astaire, and that when he does a double or triple spin, she does one. To give her credit, most of the time she looks relaxed and confident.
What makes the movie memorable, in addition to the Arlen-Mercer songs, is Astaire's "One for My Baby" routine. He thinks he's lost Joan and he doesn't see any way to put things right in the few hours he has left before he returns to war. He starts hitting the saloons while he's singing the great Mercer words. He winds up in a high-class bar with lots of stacked glasses and mirrors, white walls and tables. And Astaire starts one of his great dances, and one of his few which explodes into destructiveness. He starts drunkenly tapping before the bar, sees a couple of glasses on a table and precisely smashes them to the floor with two kicks, leaps up furiously on the bar, down, up again, and spots all the glasses stacked up behind him. He tears into them, finishing by leaping down and throwing a chair against the mirror and the glasses. It's a great song, a great dancer and a great dance.
It's quarter to three, there's no one in the place except you and me.
So, set 'em up, Joe, I got a little story you oughta know.
We're drinkin', my friend, to the end of a brief episode.
Make it one for my baby and one more for the road.
I got the routine, so drop another nickel in the machine.
I'm feelin' so bad, wish you'd make the music pretty and sad.
Could tell you a lot, but you've got to be true to your code.
So, make it one for my baby and one more for the road.
You'd never know it but buddy, I'm a kind of poet
And I got a lot of things to say.
And when I'm gloomy, you simply gotta listen to me
'Till it's all talked away.
Well that's how it goes and Joe, I know your gettin' pretty anxious to close.
So, thanks for the cheer, I hope you didn't mind my bendin' your ear.
This torch that I found must be drowned or it soon might explode.
So, make it one for my baby and one more for the road.
That long, long road.
The movie to date is available only on VHS. The RKO Home Video tape I have looks very good.
Customer Rating:
Summary: TURNER ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL
Comment: Ted Turner and Warners Bros. have don a magnificant job restoring so many of the classic old musicals but, there are so many more that need it. this is one of them. Anything with Fred Astair needs to be re-mastered onto dolby digital DVD immediately...
Customer Rating:
Summary: He is not always very well inspired
Comment: Fred Astaire does it again in the context of WW2, in which he is a pilot. During a ten days' leave, he goes on his own in some city and seduces a photographer, a lady mind you. The film is the story of this seducing episode with all kinds of complications with her boss who is in love with her but gallantly yields, with his fellow pilots who try to inject some pepper into the situation, and with the plane industrialist who does not know anything about flying his own planes and the difficulties or dangers such an action may imply and contain. What's more there is little dancing, for once. The photographer will only discover who Fred Astaire is in the very few minutes when he is to leave. Romantic and kind of simplistic. And this is not made up by the sudden angry dancing spell in which Fred Astaire destroys a great number of glasses and even some mirrors in a ritzy bar.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
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Editorial Reviews:
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The Sky's the Limit may not be top-drawer Fred Astaire, but it's a charming, enjoyable wartime picture from his post-Ginger Rogers period. Astaire plays a decorated American fighter pilot who's taking some incognito R&R, but his laissez-faire guise ends up infuriating the young lady he's attracted to (Joan Leslie, a year removed from playing James Cagney's wife in Yankee Doodle Dandy). Leslie was perhaps Astaire's most appealing partner after Rogers, and the two first strike sparks with their smile-inducing song-and-dance duet "I've Got a Lot in Common with You." The score was also distinguished by the introduction of two all-time-classic Harold Arlen-Johnny Mercer tunes, "My Shining Hour" and "One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)," which Astaire croons atop a bar while dancing and smashing glasses. Fifteen years later, Frank Sinatra would slow "One for My Baby" to a world-weary tempo and make it his own, but the song was written for Astaire. --David Horiuchi
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