The Ritz Brother's film career I was beginning to think just as The Andrews Sister's film career was taking off. they had been recording artist for some time before Hollywood back in to put them in front of the camera, and when they did, the patriotism of the War era them at the forefront of B musicals for a good five years. For their first film, they share top billing with the Ritz Brothers, comics who had been big over at 20th Century Fox but were slightly falling out of favor as a new decade began. Over at Universal, Abbott and Costello had not quite taken the top spot as their comic team, so Universal was placing dibs on who would take off. between those two teams and Olsen and Johnson, Universal had their hands full.
The musical itself is very corny and extremely dated, but every time The Andrews Sisters get to sing, it comes alive. This life premise has the Ritz Brothers managers of a band and a singing team, stowing away on a ship to Argentina to bask in the popularity Latino trend of the day. To say that they are no competition for Carmen Miranda or other popular Hispanic artists of the time is an understatement. This is no "Down Argentine Way" or "That Night in Rio", featuring phony bandits and hotel owners who have been fleeced by someone who claimed to own the Chiseler Build in New York City.
The Andrews Sisters score with "Rum Boogie" (not quite "Rum and Coca-Cola", but close), what's a rich Brothers tearing apart when they attempt to do it in drag. There's also a spoof of "The Carioca", a seven-year-old song that perhaps didn't need to be parodied. when the sisters aren't singing and the brothers aren't clowning, there's a bit of romance provided by soloist Constance Moore and phony bandit George Reeves, basically a distraction from the songs. It's important as a record of the sisters first entrance onto screen, but whether or not the audience takes to the Ritz Brothers will be based on their tolerance of their antics. For me, I can take them or leave them, and here, they only score a few laughs.
The musical itself is very corny and extremely dated, but every time The Andrews Sisters get to sing, it comes alive. This life premise has the Ritz Brothers managers of a band and a singing team, stowing away on a ship to Argentina to bask in the popularity Latino trend of the day. To say that they are no competition for Carmen Miranda or other popular Hispanic artists of the time is an understatement. This is no "Down Argentine Way" or "That Night in Rio", featuring phony bandits and hotel owners who have been fleeced by someone who claimed to own the Chiseler Build in New York City.
The Andrews Sisters score with "Rum Boogie" (not quite "Rum and Coca-Cola", but close), what's a rich Brothers tearing apart when they attempt to do it in drag. There's also a spoof of "The Carioca", a seven-year-old song that perhaps didn't need to be parodied. when the sisters aren't singing and the brothers aren't clowning, there's a bit of romance provided by soloist Constance Moore and phony bandit George Reeves, basically a distraction from the songs. It's important as a record of the sisters first entrance onto screen, but whether or not the audience takes to the Ritz Brothers will be based on their tolerance of their antics. For me, I can take them or leave them, and here, they only score a few laughs.