{"id":45696,"date":"2019-11-13T12:11:29","date_gmt":"2019-11-13T19:11:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=45696"},"modified":"2021-01-23T21:51:20","modified_gmt":"2021-01-24T04:51:20","slug":"birth-of-the-blues-1941","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=45696","title":{"rendered":"Birth of the Blues (1941)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>&#8220;Our music sure is going high-brow!&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<table>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Poster.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Poster-202x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"202\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-45697\" srcset=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Poster-202x300.jpg 202w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Poster-86x128.jpg 86w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Poster.jpg 580w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 202px) 100vw, 202px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Synopsis:<\/strong><br \/>\nWith support from a family servant (Eddie &#8216;Rochester&#8217; Anderson), a clarinetist (Bing Crosby) in New Orleans builds on a rich tradition of African-American blues music in constructing his own White band &#8212; including a recently jailed cornet player (Brian Donlevy) and a singer (Mary Martin) with a young aunt (Carolyn Lee).\n<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p>\n<strong>Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Bing Crosby Films<\/li>\n<li>Brian Donlevy Films<\/li>\n<li>Gangsters<\/li>\n<li>Love Triangle Films<\/li>\n<li>Musicians<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Review: <\/strong><br \/>\nThe Oscar-nominated score is the best feature by far of this white-washed recounting of &#8220;how the blues were born&#8221;. To the film&#8217;s credit, it openly acknowledges the origination of the blues with Black players (albeit showing them stereotypically wide-eyed), and doesn&#8217;t shy away from using era-specific language around the &#8220;need&#8221; to find a White cornet player for the band &#8212; but modern-day viewers&#8217; tolerance for watching this kind of narrative will likely be limited. Making matters worse, the framing storyline is shaky at best: meager comedic mileage is milked out of the band&#8217;s &#8220;meet-cute&#8221; with Martin and her 5-year-old (!) aunt (Carolyn Lee); a fabricated (and unconvincing) love triangle plays out between Crosby, Martin, and Donlevy; and the sudden introduction of a gangster-driven subplot near the end forces things to literally get moving. While some film fanatics may be curious to see Martin in one of her rare on-screen appearances, this one unfortunately doesn&#8217;t do her justice.   <\/p>\n<p><strong>Redeeming Qualities and Moments: <\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Many fine musical numbers<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Musical.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Musical.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-45699\" srcset=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Musical.png 960w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Musical-300x225.png 300w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Musical-128x96.png 128w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Musical-768x576.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><\/li>\n<li>Some atmospheric cinematography<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Cinematography.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Cinematography.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-45698\" srcset=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Cinematography.png 960w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Cinematography-300x225.png 300w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Cinematography-128x96.png 128w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Birth-of-the-Blues-Cinematography-768x576.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Must See? <\/strong><br \/>\nNo; you can skip this one unless you&#8217;d like to hear the music. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Links: <\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt0033396\/\">IMDb entry<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1941\/12\/11\/archives\/birth-of-the-blues-film-mostly-old-songs-seen-at-paramount-cadet.html\">NY Times Original Review<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thespinningimage.co.uk\/cultfilms\/displaycultfilm.asp?reviewid=2569&#038;aff=13\">Spinning Image Review<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;Our music sure is going high-brow!&#8221; Synopsis: With support from a family servant (Eddie &#8216;Rochester&#8217; Anderson), a clarinetist (Bing Crosby) in New Orleans builds on a rich tradition of African-American blues music in constructing his own White band &#8212; including a recently jailed cornet player (Brian Donlevy) and a singer (Mary Martin) with a young aunt (Carolyn Lee). Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors: Bing Crosby Films Brian Donlevy Films Gangsters Love Triangle Films Musicians Review: The Oscar-nominated score is the&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=45696\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45696"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65472,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45696\/revisions\/65472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}