Holiday Inn: 75th Anniversary Edition - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Holiday Inn: 75th Anniversary Edition

Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score: ​

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Movie
About 12 years before White Christmas was born, Bing Crosby was already crooning his famous song of the same name to audiences everywhere with 1942’s Holiday Inn along with Fred Astaire. Rumor has it that Irving Berlin (the writer of the song) had pitched the tune to Fred Astaire years earlier, but he had declined and the song went to Bing. Years after that Berlin and crew was banging around the idea for a “Holiday themed Inn” musical with song and dance everywhere. Back in 1942 Paramount wasn’t exactly churning out musicals left and right, but Irving Berlin was THE name for musicals so they decided to take a chance with him and Holiday Inn was born.

I have a HUGE weakness for musicals, and an even bigger weakness for holiday themed ones at that. White Christmas is probably my favorite holiday musical of all time (I can’t get enough of Danny Kaye), but Holiday Inn was always the predecessor that played second fiddle to the famed Christmas themed movie. It came with a little lighter of a plot base, as well as a darker theme, but the pairing of Astaire, Reynolds and Crosby was a magic success that has always created a rift in musical fans. Which was the better holiday musical? Holiday Inn or White Christmas?

Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire are the song and dance duo of Jim Hardy and Ted Hanover, but we’re introduced to them just as their partnership is coming to an end. Jim is going to quit the vaudeville trio made up of himself, Ted and female dancer Lila Dixon (Virginia Dale), and move out to the country with Lila, leaving Ted alone. The thing is, there’s a bit of a love triangle here, as little does Jim know that Lila and Ted are in love and planning to stay together. Realizing that he just dodged a romantic bullet, Jim leaves the two to their fate and starts up his ill fated farm. As you probably could have guessed, Jim isn’t exactly a farmer and soon he’s ready to get back into show business. This time he doesn’t want to partner up, but instead decides to turn his farm into a bed and breakfast Inn that is only open on the holidays. There it will feature vaudeville style entertainment and hopefully be something that will propel Jim to full time.

While there Jim hires young aspiring dancer Linda Mason (Marjorie Reynolds), who is just looking for the right opportunity to get into show business. The two soon start to fall in love and move towards their own stable future when Ted comes in like a wrecking ball. It seems that Lila did the same thing to Ted that she did to Jim and poor Ted is now the jilted lover. In a drunken haze he ends up dancing with Linda before she soon becomes his Cinderella and vanishes into the night, only to come back for another Holiday production. Twitterpeted and dreaming of a new dance/romance partner, Ted begs Jim for help in tracking her down, not realizing that the woman he danced with was his partner’s new girl. What happens next is classic musical love triangles, with Ted pursuing his little Cinderella, while Jim dances around the subject and does his best subvert his old friend/partner’s acquisition of yet ANOTHER one of his women.

Holiday Inn is a charming little film that really doesn’t try to be TOO heavy, or too full of itself. The love triangle between Ted, Jim and Linda is never really that series, and actually kind of forced part of the time. We all know who is going to end up with Linda in the long run, and it’s more a vehicle for Bing Crosby to croon to his hearts content while Marjorie Reynolds and Fred Astaire get to show off their dancing moves. A decision that works out well, as they are the highlight of the film with a quite a bit of flair and pizzazz.

Ironically, Holiday Inn had a bit of a checkered production past, as the film had to be halted and adjusted part way through filming as Pearl Harbor happened. Irving Berlin is a massive patriot and very proud of his new homeland, thus the rocking “4th of July” scene was added in as Berlin really wanted a a stars and stripes theme to a portion of it. Despite the small hiccups, the musical became an overnight success for Paramount, and paved the way for the superior White Christmas as they gained the courage to take on more musical productions at at time when Paramount really wasn’t that into musicals.




Rating:

Not Rated by the MPAA




Video:

The 75th Anniversary edition of Holiday Inn sources itself from the regular version in 2014, and in fact is the EXACT same disc. Down the extras and menu. Thus it will have the same transfer if you have already seen it. Both colorized and the original black ‘n’ white version are included, but I would dare say the black and white version is easily the definitive version to watch as the colorized version was done rather haphazardly back in the day, with whole sections not covering the entire screen with colorization, and the colors themselves are rather weak. Not to mention the fact that colorizing a black and white film is kind of looked down upon by purists. The original black and white transfer used doesn’t appear to have been struck from a minty fresh master, but Universal’s encode looks quite solid and surprisingly unmolested. The grain field is natural, with a nice thin layer that is noticeable, but still stays under control. Unlike a lot of Universal catalog titles, there is almost no signs of digital smoothing, or other master related debaucheries that Uni was known for. Fine detail appear pleasant, and the black and white photography as sharp as could be expected for a 1942 film.






Audio:

The film comes with a theatrical 2.0 Mono track in DTS-HD MA, and its everything you would expect from a film of this ilk. Dialog is crisp and clear, but there is a few times where the dialog softens just a bit, and you have to strain for just a moment to hear what is being said (the same thing can happen to the music). The musical film relies heavily on the musical numbers and those come through with great presence in the fronts, and there is even some very mild LFE baked into the 2.0 mix. It’s not a film that will explode your home theater system, but the 2.0 Mono track does everything asked of it without complaining, and the music really lights up those 2 mains with minimal hiss (something that's almost impossible to avoid with this genre of sound capturing).


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Extras:

• A Couple of Song and Dance Men
• All Singing - All Dancing
• Coloring a Classic
• Feature Commentary
• Theatrical Trailer
• 2016 Broadway Musical version of Holiday Inn

Final Score: ​

Out of the two big holiday themed films, Holiday Inn is a worthy competitor for White Christmas, but struggles to maintain the same sense of joy and camaraderie that the predecessor enjoys. The fighting and squabbling of the main characters has a bit more of a bite to it, and the constant swapping back and forth between the two lends itself to a darker theme if you look past the Christmas trappings and the famous songs. I did have a chuckle at the one “Abraham” scene, which would be EVISCERATED in modern filming as racist, but the movie is a fantastic watch and well worth picking up if you don’t already have the film. The 2016 Broadway musical edition is the only really “addition” to the 2014 set, but it is a fairly hefty extra if you want that to add to the collection too, and almost is a “2 in 1” film set here.




Technical Specifications:

Starring: Bing Crosby, Marjorie Reynolds, Fred Astaire
Directed by Mark Sandrich
Written by: Claude Binyon (Screenplay), Elmer Rice (Adaptation)
Aspect Ratio: 1.35:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA Mono 2.0
Studio: Universal
Rated: NR
Runtime: 101 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: October 24th, 2017

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• Michael Scott
• May 11, 2017

Recommendation: Good Watch

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. I can't really remember if I already saw this one or not before.. Either way, will check it out.

 

[Todd Anderson]

Embarrassed to say that I've not only never seen this... I've never heard of it!

 

[Michael Scott]

Embarrassed to say that I've not only never seen this... I've never heard of it!

I'm not even sure how to respond to that Tddd. I'm disappointed in you

 

[Todd Anderson]

I've let you down a lot this year, Mike!

I'm okay with it though...