Shall We Dance

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Product Details

Director : Mark Sandrich
Actor : Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore, Jerome Cowan
Format : NTSC
Binding : VHS Tape
EAN : 9780780625785
Product Group : Video
Release Date : 1999-04-27
Studio : Warner
UPC : 053939657036

ASIN : 0780625781

Editorial Reviews

From Amazon.com

The chemistry between Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers was still going strong in their seventh spin around the dance floor, Shall We Dance? And this time--amidst the usual improbable plot confusions and on-again, off-again flirting between the two--they were backed up by a song score provided by the matchless George and Ira Gershwin. Among the highlights are "They All Laughed," "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off," and the Oscar-nominated "They Can't Take That Away from Me." Director Mark Sandrich, the most frequent helmer of the Astaire-Rogers pictures (including Top Hat), creates a gleaming showcase for his stars. He also brings back two devilish character actors, Edward Everett Horton and Eric Blore, to repeat their support from previous outings. Ginger is kicky and fun; she was one of the few partners who didn't look intimidated onscreen by Astaire's incomparable dancing skills. Fred is in great form himself--so good you almost believe it when he pretends to be a Russian. --Robert Horton

Customer Reviews

Fred & Ginger Meets the Gershwin Brothers (2004-03-12)

Great Music and Great Dancing! The storyline is funny and entertaining, one of the finest Astaire/Rogers Films. The highlight of the film is the dance number with the rollerskates!

Featuring Songs By George and Ira Gershwin (2003-08-06)

The emphasis in SHALL WE DANCE? is even more than usual on the dancing of Fred Astair and GINGER Rogers. The movie includes six songs by George and Ira Gershwin and is based on a story by Lee Loeb and Harold Buchman. Much humor is provided by Edward Everett Horton and Eric Biore.

The film received an Oscar nomination in 1937 for Best Song ("They Can't Take That Away from Me")

Mark Sandrich also directed THE GAY DIVORCEE.

My Favorite of All the Fred and Ginger's (2003-07-07)

"Shall We Dance" is perhaps the finest example of the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers partnership. Set to the music of the Gershwin brothers, Ginger is a musical comedy star and Fred is a famous "Russian Ballet Dancer" from Penn. He sees her and falls in love, she doesn't like him, everyone thinks they are married, then they really are - and it keeps getting better. The dance scenes are elaborate - imagine roller skates and 30 dancers with Ginger's face - and extremely well done. The supporting cast also help to make the movie. Even though the movie is good, it would be nothing without the help of Eric Blore and Edward Everett Horton (did I get that right?). The plot is contemporary, the scenes are funny and everything is totally relatable - not counting the fact that everyone spontaneously bursts into song and dance at least once every 7 minutes. If you have never seen a Fred and Ginger movie, this is the one you should see either first or last. Get your feet wet with the best or save it for last. Definately don't miss it.

One of the Best Astaire & Rogers films (2003-04-24)

I think this is one of my favorite movies of all time. Fred Astaire as the famous ballet dancer, Petrov, is hilarious, especially when he meets Linda Keene (Rogers) for the first time. The entire movie is very funny and will bring a a smile to anyone's face. "Zoom, Zoom", "They Can't Take That Away From Me", and "They All Laughed" are all brilliant. I reccomend this movie to any Astaire & Rogers fan.

Not Fred & Ginger's best, but still lots of fun (2002-12-07)

Fred Astaire, especially when paired with Ginger Rogers, is probably my favorite movie performer. I once kept a list of how many times I had seen each of his films, and had seen his 30-plus musicals over 130 times when I lost it. Despite my love for Astaire's films, this is far from my favorite Fred and Ginger film. It is by no means a bad movie, but it definitely falls short of such classics as TOP HAT or THE GAY DIVORCEE or SWING TIME.

SHALL WE DANCE is a somewhat frustrating film, because so many of the elements for a great film are there, but so many opportunities are missed. The movie has a great score, and several great classics of popular song were introduced in it, but this in part points out the problems in the film. The two finest songs are "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off" and the extraordinary "They Can't Take That Away from Me," but neither is well utilized. Instead of dancing to the former, Fred and Ginger do a novelty dance with roller skates, upon which they are stiff and which produce an irritatingly loud rasping sound. The latter song is one of the two or three greatest songs in any of their films, but an unspeakable outrage occurs: they do not dance to it. What could have provided the occasion for a great dance along the lines of "Never Gonna Dance" from SWING TIME or "Let's Face the Music and Dance." Instead, Fred sings this heartbreakingly beautiful song, and the music unexpectedly ends with no dance. When Fred and Ginger reunited in THE BARKLEYS OF BROADWAY, they try to correct this wrong by dancing to it, but this hardly corrects the error in the earlier film.

The supporting cast is first rate, but to me, at least, the parts played by Edward Everett Horton and Eric Blore, otherwise two of my favorite character actors, seem a bit formulaic, efforts at imitating their earlier triumphs in other Astaire-Rogers films.

The plot is pretty hard to swallow. Fred Astaire as Peter P. Peters, a ballet star who prefers to tap dance, is a stretch even by musical comedy standards. And the plot device that a photograph of a woman in dressing gown beside a man who is asleep would convince the world that the couple was married is impossible to swallow. All in all, a pretty disappointing film by the greatest dance team in the history of cinema. Great stars, great songs, but an exceedingly [slow] plot and not nearly enough dances. Worse of all, squandering an opportunity for Fred and Ginger to dance to one of the Gershwin brothers greatest numbers.

Still, it is Astaire and Rogers, and while the film is far from what it might have been, it is still a lot of fun. Not TOP HAT or even FOLLOW THE FLEET (which was flawed but featured absolutely stunning dances), but still quite decent.

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