Neil Welch
On the edges of New York's criminal underworld, Nathan Detroit finds it increasingly difficult to find venues for the illegal games of craps he arranges. A complicated bet sees a venue forthcoming while gambler Sky Masterson takes Salvation Army sergeant Sarah on a date to Cuba. Meanwhile, Nathan is trying to avoid marriage to his fiancée of 14 years, Miss Adelaide.Based on a hit Broadway musical which was, in turn, based on stories by Damon Runyan, Guys and Dolls is bright and colourful, with highly stylised city backdrops, some great songs and engaging dancing, a distinct and individual identity thanks to Runyan's unique dialogue, and great performances from the principles.It's one of the classic musicals from the 50s, and deservedly so.
Leofwine_draca
GUYS AND DOLLS should be a fantastic, show-stopping musical...but it isn't. I can't quite put my finger on it, but there's something about this one that leaves me a little cold. Sure, it looks the part, and the cast is fine, but it's the storyline that I find lacking. It's just a little defunct, a little set back, so that you never really get involved with the various characters and their relationships.The problem I find with some musicals is that, between the song-and-dance numbers, they can be a little, well, dull. That's the case with GUYS AND DOLLS, particularly early on. This is an overlong film that feels notably drawn out, especially in the first half. Even worse, it lacks the razzmatazz that you come to expect from a Hollywood musical during the golden era.There's little to dislike in the pairing of Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra, but to be fair these two don't get much screen time. I found the character played by Jean Simmons - a prim-and-proper Salvation Army girl - drained energy from the proceedings. It doesn't help that the songs aren't all that memorable, either, with the exception of the climactic "luck be a lady" number, which is the sole moment when GUYS AND DOLLS feels like a "proper" musical. Sadly, the rest is just so-so.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
That musical, if it did not have the music, and I do not say the singing, would be today forgotten. The story is zilch. The plot is null. The drama is hilarious. The suspense is non-existent. The décor is surrealistically realistic. The cops are puppets. The gamblers are marionettes. The guys are caricatures. The dolls are evanescent. And I said, the singing is mediocre, apart from Frank Sinatra who was a singer by profession. The others, particularly Marlon Brando, are hardly good enough for a chorus line. That was 1955. The USA had no competition in the world and they thought at the time they were building the future of the cosmos. So everything they did had to be best, even if it was crap, quite the proper word for it since the main attraction of the film and the main interest of the cops were crap games. Yet the music is innovative and in a way surprising, half Broadway traditional musical and half jazzy, swinging definitely and yet missing the point due to the poor quality of the singing and the very stiff dancing. The choreographer must have been movement-challenged and he was not able to conceive of supple and flexible bodies moving along curves and curbed lines with bodies that should be continuously changing opening and closing arcs. Too bad, because a real musical could be done with some of the elements of the scenario, though there would be a lot of rewriting to do. And I must say that the Salvation Army in disguise in this film is not exactly fascinating, even if the general is a woman and the sergeant is another woman. Apart from the heavy presence of women in this good-doing-or-is- it-doing-good army that wants to save our souls it is talking gibberish most of the time, and that gibberish does not concern us really. It is from another time, another galaxy, definitely another universe.Luckily it was in a box set of five musicals, otherwise I doubt I would spend one dollar to buy it, certainly not a pound, not even a euro. If pirating is stealing, to wrap up this zilch thing between West Side Story and Man of La Mancha is really high way commercial robbery.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
PWNYCNY
This movie is terrific. Although shot on an interior set, this movie captures the essence of New York City and contains incredible performances by the the cast who succeed in making this movie work. This movie is character-driven, meaning that if the actors fail to make their characters believable, then the movie fails. This the movie avoids. Instead, what the movie delivers is first rate acting, a wonderful story, and first-rate music. Marlon Brando and Jean Simmons deliver surprisingly strong performances, which include dancing and singing (not dubbed). The chemistry between them is so strong that is it almost palpable. Although the story has an offbeat satirical quality, nevertheless it is strong dramatically. Vivian Blaine is also excellent as frank Sinatra's perennial fiancé, and the other members of the cast, especially Stubby Kaye and Johnny Silver, deliver wonderfully entertaining performances. If you like Hollywood musicals, then this movie is for you. If you don't like Hollywood musicals, watch this movie anyway; it may change your mind.
AD
