140 Character Movie Review – #140RVW
Winner of 8 Oscars and unbelievably charming even after 170 minutes (and 50 years). A timeless masterpiece no matter how you cut it. #Audrey
Spoiler-free Movie Review of My Fair Lady:
People love to recount the story of how Julie Andrews wasn’t allowed to reprise her Broadway role of Eliza Doolittle for the film adaptation of My Fair Lady and how she got the last laugh when she won the Best Actress Oscar for her performance in Mary Poppins, while Audrey Hepburn wasn’t even nominated. They like to gloat about how Hepburn was dubbed for most of her singing performances when producer Jack Warner, refusing to transpose her songs to a lower register more suited to her voice, decided that Marni Nixon’s looped voice would be better for the part. Everyone wanted Andrews to play the role in the film, including Hepburn. Walt Disney even offered to delay the filming of Mary Poppins to allow Andrews to do both pictures.
Alright, I’ll say it; Audrey Hepburn is better for this picture than Julie Andrews would have been and Warner was right to make the casting decision he did. Would Andrews have been great in the role? Of course she would have. Julie Andrews is a wonderful, world-class actress and the film would have been excellent. But it’s sublime with Hepburn…
The Academy, in sympathy for Andrews and snobbery over the looped singing, left Hepburn out of the running for Best Actress, despite being the lead in a film they would select as the Best Picture of 1964. Ridiculous. Hepburn not only deserved to be nominated, she deserved to win.
(You may be realizing by now that this review is going to be a bit of an Audrey-obsessed affair. I don’t apologize for that at all. I’m in very good company – everyone loves Audrey. But if you like, skim this one – I promise to get around to other aspects of the film at some point…)
One reason that Hepburn is so effective in this role is that she is believable consorting with both flower sellers and the gentry. I never saw Andrews perform the role, but have a hard time accepting that she’d ever seem like anything but a lady, even in the gutter. Both actresses can exude an air of royalty, but Hepburn’s rail-thin physique and experiences of malnourishment in the Second World War help to make the early scenes more plausible and Eliza’s journey more satisfying.
The movie is nearly perfect. It’s a great story – that’s why they’ve told it so many times in so many ways. The Greek myth itself is interesting and led to a host of interpretations on the stage, from operas to dramas. George Bernard Shaw’s original play Pygmalion, upon which the Lerner & Loewe musical is based, is excellent. It was adapted into a film long before this musical was even conceived of. And of course there have been a ton of updates in the years since.
But this may be the most satisfying telling of all. Shaw introducing an element of satire and social commentary about the English class system was an inspired touch and lifts the subject material to a new level, and the addition of music and then filmed spectacle makes the statement stand out most illustratively.
I won’t apologize for enjoying My Fair Lady best. Partly it’s the music, largely it’s the acting, mostly it’s the libretto/book – great dialogue. I found reading Pygmalion a little unsatisfying after seeing My Fair Lady first. That’s not really fair, but it is what it is.
One of the great joys, of course, is the spectacle on display. They quite simply don’t make them like this anymore. In truth, that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as the evolution of cinematic storytelling has for the most part been entirely improved with the passage of time, but there is no way to watch a picture of this magnitude without being impressed and a bit sad that you won’t see it’s like again.
Rex Harrison is his splendid peacock self, leading the mostly British cast through the English anachronisms and picking up a Best Actor Oscar for it. Stanley Holloway is delightful as dustman turned moralist Alfred P. Doolittle, stealing the show with two of the best numbers.
The music, for its part is top shelf. Lerner & Loewe would never do anything else quite as inspired as My Fair Lady (Paint Your Wagon somewhat cancels out Camelot and Gigi), but considering the quality of this work, it’s enough…
For all of the great dialogue, music and acting, however, My Fair Lady remains a visual extravaganza. The sets are expansive and ornate, expanding the horizons beyond those possible on stage, without ever really losing that theater ambiance. Gene Allen, Cecil Beaton and George James Hopkins won an Oscar for Art Direction, while Beaton picked up another for Costume Design. Actually, Beaton had nothing to do with the sets at all, doing only costumes, but had a very good agent & contract. (In point of fact, Beaton was such a distraction that he was actually barred from the filming set and the art department.)
The costumes are indeed great; most of them are pretty straightforward period pieces. But Hepburn’s outfits…
Shot in glorious 65mm by Harry Stradling (who also got an Oscar…), the picture is beautifully lit and the colors are warm and inviting, even if there seems to be an intentional softening over the whole thing.
All of this comes together to make a true classic, one of the all-time great film musicals. Loverly…
Poster:
Trailer:
Bechdel Test:
Pass
The Representation Test Score: C (6 pts)
(http://therepresentationproject.org/grading-hollywood-the-representation-test/)
| Main Cast | Audrey Hepburn Eliza Doolittle, Rex Harrison Professor Henry Higgins, Stanley Holloway Alfred P. Doolittle, Wilfrid Hyde-White Colonel Hugh Pickering |
| Rating | G |
| Release Date | Fri 25 Dec 1964 UTC |
| Director | George Cukor |
| Genres | Drama, Family, Musical, Romance |
| Plot | A misogynistic and snobbish phonetics professor agrees to a wager that he can take a flower girl and make her presentable in high society. |
| Poster |  |
| Runtime | 170 |
| Tagline | The loverliest motion picture of them all! |
| Writers | Alan Jay Lerner (book), George Bernard Shaw (as Bernard Shaw) (from a play by) |
| Year | 1964 |
