This movie, which combines a sailors-on-leave plot (the 1930s couldn't get enough of these) with a backstage musical plot (ditto), is reasonably entertaining and diverting. Francis Langford is a charmer, and Una Merkel and Raymond Walburn were always under-appreciated comics. It's fun to see Buddy Ebsen dance and even funnier to hear Jimmy Stewart sing. Stewart and Powell don't have much chemistry but they do have a natural rapport; they were both frank, sporty, outdoorsy types.
But today there is really only one reason to hunt down this movie: the big finale by the 24-year-old Eleanor Powell. Though both the battleship set and the naval costumes are "a monument to bad taste", Powell's dancing is an amazing display of strength, speed, rhythm, endurance, precision, and control, and has to be seen four or five times in order to take it all in. It is shot mainly in long takes and combines tap, ballet, and athletics in the way only Powell could quite manage. The Cole Porter song ("Swingin' the Jinx Away") used as backing is also very clever, although "Easy to Love" is better and is the song that is usually remembered from this movie.
But today there is really only one reason to hunt down this movie: the big finale by the 24-year-old Eleanor Powell. Though both the battleship set and the naval costumes are "a monument to bad taste", Powell's dancing is an amazing display of strength, speed, rhythm, endurance, precision, and control, and has to be seen four or five times in order to take it all in. It is shot mainly in long takes and combines tap, ballet, and athletics in the way only Powell could quite manage. The Cole Porter song ("Swingin' the Jinx Away") used as backing is also very clever, although "Easy to Love" is better and is the song that is usually remembered from this movie.