Mardi Gras Film Review: Dixiana (dir by Luther Reed)

Posted on February 20, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Mardi Gras in New Orleans has always been a legendary party.

If you doubt me on this, just watch the 1930 film, Dixiana. Dixiana is all about Mardi Gras. I mean, there is a plot of sorts but it’s pretty easy to guess that, for audiences in 1930, the promise of a spectacular Madi Gras finale (filmed in technicolor, I might add) was the main appeal of this film. Dixiana itself takes place in the 1840s so there you have it. 90 years ago, RKO Pictures made a lavish movie about a Mardi Gras celebration that had happened nearly 100 years earlier. That’s quite a legendary party, no?

As with many pre-Code films about the Antebellum South, it can be a bit awkward to watch Dixiana today. This is a film that opens on a plantation, with Cornelius Van Horn (Joseph Cawthorn) and his son, Carl (Everett Marshall), discussing how much they enjoy listening to the slaves sing about the Mississippi River. They’re amazed that the slaves can sing so beautifully about water. (It doesn’t occur to them that the song was actually about going up the river and finding freedom.) Cornelius and Carl, we discover, are actually from Pennsylvania. Cornelius has recently remarried, to the snobbish Birdie (Jobnya Howland) and both he and his son have only recently moved down to her native Louisiana. Carl and Cornelius are still getting used to life in and the customs of the South. Cornelius, for instance, explains that he regularly frees some of his slaves and he imagines that’s why they’re always so happy. But if he really wants them all to be happy why doesn’t he just free them all and maybe stop buying slaves all together? Let’s just say that Dixiana is not the film to watch if you’re looking for an honest look at American life before the Civil War.

Anyway, if you’re still interested in seeing the film after reading all of that, the majority of Dixiana takes place in New Orleans. Carl goes into town, does some gambling, and sees a show. He is immediately smitten with a performer named Dixiana (Bebe Daniels) and he asks her to marry him. Even though her two best friends, Peewee and Ginger (played by the comedy team of Wheeler and Woolsey), are weary, Dixiana accepts his proposal. Carl takes Dixiana back to the plantation with him. Unfortunately, he also takes Peewee and Ginger and they soon let slip that they’re all circus performers. Birdie is scandalized. There’s no way her stepson is going to bring shame on the family by marrying a circus performer!

So, Dixiana and her friends head back to New Orleans. The circus no longer wants her so Dixiana is forced to work in a gambling hall that’s owned by smarmy Royal Montague (Ralf Harolde). Montague has his own personal interest in Dixiana but she’s still in love with Carl. So, Royal plots to not only have Dixiana crowned as the Queen of Mardi Gras but also to trick Carl into accept a duel with him. Montague, of course, plans to pull an Aaron Burr and cheat. Meanwhile, Peewee and Ginger steal money, kick each other in the backside, and fight a duel of their own….

And really, none of that matters. In the end, the film’s storyline is mostly just busywork. The main reason that anyone would want to see this film is for the final 20 minutes, which is when the grainy black-and-white cinematography is replaced by gloriously vibrant technicolor and the Mardi Gras celebrations begin. There’s singing. There’s dancing. There’s even Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, making his film debut and dancing up a storm. Seriously, 1840s Mardi Gras looked like it would have been fun to attend, even if it does sometimes seem more like a lively cotillion as opposed to the orgy of alcohol poisoning that everyone knows and loves today.

Dixiana is one of those films that’s fallen into the public domain and, as such, it tends to turn up in a lot of cheap DVD boxsets. There’s quite a few prints out that are completely in black-and-white and which don’t feature the sudden change to color. That’s a shame because, whatever flaws this film may have, it does make good use of that technicolor during the final 20 minutes. It’s big and lavish and gorgeous to look at and it’s easy to imagine the valuable escape that it provided for audiences at the start of the Depression.

Today, Dixiana is probably most interesting as a historical document. It’s not quite as racy as one might expect from a pre-code film but it’s a good example of the type of lavish musicals that were popular among audiences who, in the 30s, used the film as a way to escape from the grimness of reality. And, if nothing else, it’s proof that Mardi Gras in New Orleans has always been a big deal.

Cleaning Out The DVR, Again #12: Naughty Marietta (dir by W.S. Van Dyke)

Posted on July 1, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Continuing the process of cleaning out my DVR, I watched the 1935 film, Naughty Marietta. I recorded Naughty Marietta off of TCM on April 3rd. Like many of the films that I record off of TCM, Naughty Marietta was nominated for Best Picture. In fact, if not for that Oscar nomination long ago, Naughty Marietta would probably be totally forgotten.

Instead, it’s only partially forgotten.

Based on an operetta and containing at least one song that I’ve sung while drunk (that song, incidentally, would be Ah! Sweet Mystery of Life), Naughty Marietta tells the story of Princess Marie (Jeanette MacDonald). A Spanish princess, Marie is engaged (against her will) to the elderly Don Carlos (Walter Kingsford). In order to escape a life of forced marriage, Marie pretends to be a servant girl named Marietta and stows away on a boat to New Orleans. The boat is carrying women to the new world so that they marry French colonists. The other women on board are shocked when Marietta announces that she plans to never marry.

However, they are even more shocked when the boat is taken over by pirates! The pirates kill the crew and take the women prisoner. The pirates take the women to Louisiana where, fortunately, a group of mercenaries led by Captain Richard Warrington (Nelson Eddy) show up and rescue the women.

Marie negotiates for Warrington to take the women to New Orleans and it’s obvious from the start that Marie and Warrington are attracted to each other. However, Warrington claims that, much like Marie, he plans to never marry! Oh my God, could it be that these two are meant to get together!?

It has all the potential for being a good musical and Jeannette MacDonald gives a good performance as Marie. But, unfortunately, Nelson Eddy is a lot less charismatic in the role of Warrington. Even his singing voice is a bit blah. Oddly, Naughty Marietta was one of many romantic musicals that Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy made together. The reason I use the term “odd,” is because — judging from this film — they didn’t appear to have much onscreen chemistry. Whereas MacDonald is personable and relatable, Nelson Eddy seems to hold the audience at a distance. Watching a film like this, you can’t help but regret that Jeanette MacDonald didn’t have someone like Fred Astaire for a co-star.

As for Naughty Marietta‘s best picture nomination — well, it was a big production and it was also an adaptation of a popular operetta. At a time when 10 films were nominated every year and the studios pretty much controlled which one of their films was nominated for best picture, Naughty Marietta got a nomination. However, the Oscar went to Mutiny on the Bounty.

Cleaning Out The DVR #30: The Great Ziegfeld (dir by Robert Z. Leonard)

Posted on March 17, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(For those following at home, Lisa is attempting to clean out her DVR by watching and reviewing 38 films by the end of this Friday. Will she make it? Keep following the site to find out!)

Do you know who Florence Ziegfeld was?

Don’t feel bad if you don’t because, until I saw the 1936 film The Great Ziegfeld, I had no idea and history is my number one obsession. Florence Ziegfeld was a theatrical producer who, in the early days of the 20th Century, produced huge spectacles. He was a showman who understood the importance of celebrity and gossip. He produced a show called The Ziegfeld Follies, which was considered quite risqué at the time but which looks remarkably tame today. Florence Ziegfeld was so famous that he even got his own Oscar-winning biopic.

The Great Ziegfeld features the always smooth William Powell as Ziegfeld. When we first meet him, he’s promoting a strongman and a belly dancer and nobody takes him seriously. But through hard work, good luck, and his own instinct for showmanship, he becomes famous and his shows gets bigger and bigger. The film follows Ziegfeld as he gets married, both times to someone he is grooming to be a star. His first wife is Anna (Luise Rainer), who loves him but divorces him when it becomes obvious that Ziegfeld’s life will always revolve around his work. His second wife is Billie Burke and we know that she is Ziegfeld’s true love because she’s played by Myrna Loy. Whenever you see William Powell and Myrna Loy in the same film, you know that they belong together.

The majority of The Great Ziegfeld is taken up with recreations of Ziegfeld’s stage shows. In fact, the film almost feels more like a musical variety show than a real biopic. (Judging from the credits, quite a few of Ziegfeld’s stars played themselves and recreated their acts on the big screen.) I can understand why this was attractive to audiences in the 1930s. With no end in sight to The Great Depression and Ziegfeld himself recently deceased, this movie was their only opportunity to see one of his spectacles. The film made sure that they got their money’s worth.

However, for modern audiences, all of the acts just add to what is already an oppressive running time. My main impression of The Great Ziegfeld was that it was really, really long. The movie itself is well-produced and William Powell and Myrna Loy are always fun to watch but the movie just goes on and on. As well, this biopic is so worshipful of Ziegfeld — the title is meant to be taken literally — that, as a result, he comes across as being one-dimensional. I did appreciate the film as a historical artifact but otherwise, it didn’t do much for me.

However, it did something for the Academy. The Great Ziegfeld was named the best picture of 1936! Luise Rainer won best actress despite only being on-screen for a handful of scenes. So many people were critical of Rainer’s award that, the very next year, the Academy introduced the award for best supporting actress.

As for why Ziegfeld won that Oscar — well, if you look at its competition and some of the other 1936 films that received nominations, you’re struck by the lack of truly memorable films. It would appear that, in a weak year, the Academy decided to give the award to the biggest production they could find.

And that was The Great Ziegfeld.