|
Operetta Films
Operetta films (German: Operettenfilm) are a genre of musical films associated with, but not exclusive to, German language cinema. The genre began in the late 1920s, but its roots stretch back into the tradition of nineteenth century Viennese operettas. Although some silent films had based their plots on stage operettas, the genre was largely a result of the switch from silent to sound films. The first all-talking operetta was '' The Desert Song'' (1929). This operetta had been filmed late in 1928 and was released early in 1929. The 1929 film ''Melody of the Heart'', made by the German studio UFA, is credited as being the first all-talking "operetta film" made in Europe. It had been intended as a silent film, but the dramatic arrival of sound forced its production to be switched. Its combination of music and dancing proved to be a successful formula, and it was followed by many similar films. During the 1930s the trend spread to Britain, where a number of Operetta films were mad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Genre
Genre () is any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other forms of art or entertainment, based on some set of stylistic criteria, as in literary genres, film genres, music genres, comics genres, etc. Often, works fit into multiple genres by way of borrowing and recombining these conventions. Stand-alone texts, works, or pieces of communication may have individual styles, but genres are amalgams of these texts based on agreed-upon or socially inferred conventions. Some genres may have rigid, strictly adhered-to guidelines, while others may show great flexibility. The proper use of a specific genre is important for a successful transfer of information ( media-adequacy). Critical discussion of genre perhaps began with a classification system for ancient Greek literature, as set out in Aristotle' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Love Parade
''The Love Parade'' is a 1929 American Pre-Code Hollywood, pre-Code musical comedy film, directed by Ernst Lubitsch and starring Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald, involving the marital difficulties of Queen Louise of Sylvania (MacDonald) and her consort, Count Alfred Renard (Chevalier). Despite his love for Louise and his promise to be an obedient husband, Count Alfred finds his role as a figurehead unbearable. The supporting cast features Lupino Lane, Lillian Roth and Eugene Pallette. The film was directed by Lubitsch from a screenplay by Guy Bolton and Ernest Vajda adapted from the French play ''Le Prince Consort'', written by Jules Chancel and Leon Xanrof. The play had previously been adapted for Broadway in 1905 by William Boosey and Cosmo Gordon Lennox. ''The Love Parade'' is notable for being both the film debut of Jeanette MacDonald and the first "talkie" film made by Ernst Lubitsch. The picture was also released in a French-language version called ''Parade d'am ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Moon (1930 Film)
''New Moon'' is a 1930 black-and-white American, pre-Code romantic/drama/melodrama musical film version of the operetta '' The New Moon'', with music by Sigmund Romberg and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II and others. The original stage version premiered on Broadway in 1928. A second adaptation, also titled ''New Moon'', was released in 1940. To avoid confusion with the later version, the film was shown on television as ''Parisian Belle''. The 1930 film, directed by Jack Conway, starred Grace Moore and Lawrence Tibbett. Its plot is entirely different from the original play and is set in Russia. This version added new songs not by Romberg. Plot ''New Moon'' is the name of a ship crossing the Caspian Sea. A young man named Lt. Petroff meets Princess Tanya and they have a ship-board romance. Upon arriving at the port of Krasnov, Petroff learns that Tanya is engaged to Governor Brusiloff. Petroff, disillusioned, crashes the ball to talk with Tanya. When the couple are foun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Land Of Smiles (1930 Film)
''The Land of Smiles'' () is a 1930 German operetta film directed by Max Reichmann and starring Richard Tauber, Mary Losseff and Hans Mierendorff. It is an adaptation of the operetta '' The Land of Smiles'' composed by Franz Lehár. Lehár himself appeared in the film in a small role. It was shot at the Emelka Studios in Munich with sets designed by the art director Hans Jacoby. The operetta was again adapted for a 1952 film '' The Land of Smiles'' starring Jan Kiepura. Plot It is no coincidence that the master of the house chose the Lehár operetta "The Land of Smiles" for a performance in honor of his daughter's forthcoming marriage to an "exotic prince", a Japanese diplomat. It's meant to be a metaphor of what might await them. The well-known plot of the Lehár operetta about a tragic marriage between a Chinese prince named Sou Chong and a young Austrian shows parallels to the upcoming, real connection of the lord's daughter, who breaks up with her local admirer Gustl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dixiana (film)
''Dixiana'' (1930) is a lavish American pre-Code comedy, musical film directed by Luther Reed and produced and distributed by RKO Radio Pictures. The final twenty minutes of the picture were photographed in Technicolor. The film stars Bebe Daniels, Everett Marshall, Bert Wheeler, Robert Woolsey, Joseph Cawthorn, Jobyna Howland, Ralf Harolde, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson (in his film debut) and Dorothy Lee. The script was adapted by Luther Reed from a story by Anne Caldwell. This is the film in which composer Max Steiner received his first screen credit for orchestration. Additionally, it was Wheeler & Woolsey's third film; however, as they were not yet an official "team," they were still billed separately. Plot Dixiana Caldwell and her friends, Peewee and Ginger, are circus performers in the antebellum Southern United States. When Dixiana falls in love with a young Southern aristocrat, Carl Van Horn, she leaves the circus where she is employed and, with Peewee an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Viennese Nights
''Viennese Nights'' is a 1930 American all-talking pre-Code musical operetta film directed by Alan Crosland and starring Alexander Gray, Vivienne Segal, Walter Pidgeon, Jean Hersholt, Bela Lugosi and Louise Fazenda. It was photographed entirely in Technicolor and released by Warner Brothers. ''Viennese Nights'' was the first original operetta written especially for the screen by Oscar Hammerstein II and Sigmund Romberg. It was filmed in March and April 1930, before anyone realized the extent of the economic hardships that would arrive with the Great Depression, which had begun in the autumn of the previous year. Although not a box office hit in the United States, the film had long box office runs in Britain and Australia. It is one of the earliest sound films to have a short pre-credit sequence. Plot In 1890 in Vienna, von Renner, Sascher, and Stirner, who are three close friends, are going to join the Austrian army. Eventually, von Renner become a lieutenant and as a supe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sweet Kitty Bellairs (1930 Film)
''Sweet Kitty Bellairs'' is a 1930 American historical musical comedy film directed by Alfred E. Green. The film is based on the 1903 play '' Sweet Kitty Bellairs'' by David Belasco. Belasco's play was in turn adapted from the novel ''The Bath Comedy'' (1900) by Agnes Castle and Egerton Castle. This novel also served as source material for the 1930 musical film. Shot entirely in Technicolor, the film stars Claudia Dell, Ernest Torrence and, Walter Pidgeon and is set in Bath, England in 1793. Belasco's 1903 play starred Henrietta Crosman. It was also the basis for a silent film adaptation starring Mae Murray followed in 1916. Plot Kitty Bellairs ( Claudia Dell), a famous flirt of her day, comes to Bath for the season. Early on in the film she declares that "in spite of her thirty or forty affairs, I've lost not a bit of my virtue." Her path is strewn with a number of conquests, including an enamored highwayman, a lord and some others who hang on her every word. A highw ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Lottery Bride
''The Lottery Bride'' is a 1930 American Pre-Code musical film directed by Paul L. Stein and starring Jeanette MacDonald, John Garrick, ZaSu Pitts, and Joe E. Brown. The film was produced by Joseph M. Schenck and Arthur Hammerstein, based on the musical by Rudolf Friml, and released by United Artists. William Cameron Menzies is credited with the production design and special effects. The film's final reel was in Technicolor in the original 80-minute release in 1930. However, most existing prints are black-and-white prints of the shorter (67-minute) 1937 re-release. Plot Cast * Jeanette MacDonald as Jenny * John Garrick as Chris * Joe E. Brown as Hoke * Zasu Pitts as Hilda * Robert Chisholm as Olaf * Joseph Macauley as Alberto * Harry Gribbon as Boris * Carroll Nye as Nels Preservation status On December 14, 2011, Turner Classic Movies presented a print of this film from George Eastman House, which restored the tinted sequences and the final reel in Technicol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Vagabond King (1930 Film)
''The Vagabond King'' is a 1930 American Pre-Code musical operetta film photographed entirely in two-color Technicolor. The plot of the film was based on the 1925 operetta of the same name, which was based on the 1901 play ''If I Were King'' by Justin Huntly McCarthy. The play told the story of the real-life renegade French poet named François Villon. The music of the film was based on a 1925 operetta, also based on the play ''If I Were King'' by McCarthy. The operetta is also titled ''The Vagabond King'' with music by Rudolph Friml and lyrics by Brian Hooker and W.H. Post. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Art Direction. Plot The story takes place in France in the Middle Ages. King Louis XI of France ( O. P. Heggie) (reigned 1461-1483), hoping to enlist the French peasants in his upcoming battle against the Burgundians, appoints François Villon ( Dennis King) king of France for one day. Despite being successful against the Burgundians, François Villon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Golden Dawn (film)
''Golden Dawn'' is a 1930 Warner Bros. American pre-Code musical operetta film directed by Ray Enright that was photographed entirely in Technicolor. It stars Vivienne Segal, Walter Woolf King and Noah Beery. The film is based on the 1927 stage musical of the same name. Plot Dawn is a white girl who was kidnapped in infancy and is raised by a black native named Mooda, who runs a canteen in a German colonial settlement in Africa. Dawn falls in love with British rubber planter Tom Allen, who is now a prisoner of war. A native black tribal leader is also in love with Dawn and becomes jealous when he hears of Dawn's love for Allen. The Germans force Allen to return to England for attempting to steal Dawn, whom they believe is half black. When the British regain control of the territory and expel the Germans, Allen returns to the colony. The settlement experiences a drought and the local tribal leader attempts to incite the natives against Dawn, claiming that God is angry becau ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Song Of The Flame
''Song of the Flame'' is an operetta with music by Herbert Stothart and George Gershwin, and a musical book and lyrics co-written by Oscar Hammerstein II and Otto A. Harbach. Organized into a prologue, two acts, and an epilogue, the operetta is set in Moscow, Russia and Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ..., France in the Spring of 1917. ''Song of the Flame'' premiered on Broadway at the 44th Street Theatre on December 30, 1925. It ran for a total of 219 performances; closing on July 10, 1926 after 219 performances. Directed by Frank Reicher and choreographed by Jack Haskell, the production used sets created by the Australian designer Joseph Urban and costumes designed by Mark Mooring. The cast included Phoebe Brune as Natasha, Greek Evans as Konstantin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Rogue Song
''The Rogue Song'' is a 1930 American pre-Code romantic and musical film that tells the story of a Russian bandit who falls in love with a princess, but takes his revenge on her when her brother rapes and kills his sister. The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer production was directed by Lionel Barrymore and released in two versions, with and without sound. Hal Roach wrote and directed the Laurel and Hardy sequences and was not credited. The film stars Metropolitan Opera singer Lawrence Tibbett—who was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance—and Catherine Dale Owen. Laurel and Hardy were third-billed; their sequences were filmed at the last minute and interspersed throughout the film in an attempt to boost its potential box-office appeal. This film, MGM's first all-talking Technicolor film,Bann, Richard W. (2000"More 'Rogue Song' Footage Found"''laurel-and-hardy.com'' is partially lost as there are no known complete prints of this film. Fragments do exist. Plot ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
