atlasmb Give a Girl a Break is a 1953 musical that uses the show-within-a-show convention to present some wonderful dancing. A Broadway revue is being cast and three women are up for the female lead. The three actresses are Debbie Reynolds, Helen Wood and Marge Champion. All three acquit themselves as actresses, but their dance talents are fantastic.The actors who play the lead roles in this film are adequate, but sometimes stiff, in their acting. Perhaps because Bob Fosse and Gower Champion were picked more for their dancing.In any event, I say watch this movie for its dancing. There is enough of it to be interesting. The film is directed by Stanley Donen and has numerous similarities to Singin' in the Rain, released the year before. A good pedigree. Gower Champion, Stanley Donen and Bob Fosse choreographed. Although Fosse's idol was Astaire, you can definitely see similarities to Gene Kelly's dance style. The rooftop dance is jazzy (highlighting the great music in this film), and might be seen to predate West Side Story.For me, the best part is the trio of dream sequences, each featuring one of the three actresses and her admirer. I could write paragraphs about them. The dance that features reverse motion might be gimmicky, but it's clever.The movie's end is anticlimactic, there are some awkward choices in staging, and other production aspects might have been sacrificed for quality dance numbers, but if you watch it just for the dance, it delivers.The plot is really about the sacrifices that dancers make for their craft. To paraphrase one character: You can always get another husband, but this is a once in a lifetime (dance) part. How can you go wrong with the cute-but-sometimes-sexy Reynolds, the classy Marge Champion, Helen Wood (yowza!), smooth Gower Champion, and the dynamic Bob Fosse?

jhkp A good, not great, MGM musical, with the emphasis on dance. Story is: what happens when a star walks out on a Broadway show, and three girls compete for the part. The dances are so expert and entertaining, you may be able to forgive the drab quality of some of the rest of the film.The Champions were not really movie stars, and neither was Bob Fosse. (Debbie Reynolds became one later, and you can see why.) Gower plays the director fairly well, but I kept picturing Gene Kelly. The part needs a more dynamic actor.If you enjoy dancing, there's plenty of it, and it's excellent! Helen Wood is the third girl and while her acting is stiff, her dancing definitely isn't.The score by Burton Lane and Ira Gershwin contains no hits, but I was charmed by the tune, "In Our United State," performed by Fosse and Reynolds.

RonSinMichigan This movie was a great and pleasant surprise. Besides being very entertaining, one can see the future styles of these 2 legendary Broadway giants. Champion's numbers are tight, synchronized, and beautifully realized . And strong . Fosse- what can I say- what a delight !! While Fosse often spoke of his limitations as a dancer, the reality is he was a brilliant one , and in his dance numbers here he already is exhibiting a unique and original style that is athletic, jazzy, sexy and charming . He was an American original . The music in this movie is very good , and serves to show off the talents of its stars. Debbie Reynolds is quite good. This movie is for Broadway and dance fans.

F Gwynplaine MacIntyre 'Give a Girl a Break' deserves to be better known; it's certainly not one of MGM's greatest musicals, but it has many bright spots and some pleasant tunes by Burton Lane with excellent lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Modern viewers will probably be most interested in Bob Fosse's excellent performance, in a supporting role.Some aspects of this movie are clearly derived from earlier and better musicals. At one point, Gower Champion's character (a Broadway director) is besieged by struggling chorus dancers who want parts in his new musical. To escape them, he climbs up the wall of his theatre. This is apparently meant to show us how virile and athletic Champion is ... but it reminded me of the scene in 'Singin' in the Rain' when Gene Kelly escapes his fans by climbing up the side of a bus. The fact that 'Give a Girl a Break' is directed by Stanley Donen (co-director of 'Singin' in the Rain') only makes the link more obvious.Gower Champion plays Ted Sturgis, the big-shot director of a new Broadway musical still in rehearsal. Bob Fosse plays Bobby, his assistant and dance captain, although Sturgis usually keeps Bobby busy fetching coffee. (Prophetically, Champion later became a major director of Broadway musicals... as did Fosse.) Kurt Kasznar plays Leo Belney, the show's musical director: a role that should have been played by Oscar Levant. Sturgis's ex-wife (played by Gower Champion's real wife Marge) is Madelyn Corlane, a former star whose popularity has faded, but who is hopeful of a comeback.When Sturgis's leading lady throws a tantrum and walks out (not likely!), he needs a new leading lady in a hurry. Whoever he chooses for the role is destined to become a star. Will Madelyn get the job? Meanwhile, Bobby has become enamoured of Suzie Doolittle (the excellent Debbie Reynolds), a talented newcomer. The more classically-minded Leo wants the leading role to go to Joanna Moss (Helen Wood), a ballet dancer he secretly hopes to romance.There's some genuine suspense as we try to guess which of these three women will get the big break. Unfortunately, the three candidates aren't equal: it's extremely obvious that highbrow ballerina Joanna hasn't got a chance against the more conventional chorines Madelyn and Suzie.The best number in the movie is 'In Our United State' performed by Fosse and Reynolds. On a couple of other occasions ('Kiss Me Kate', 'My Sister Eileen'), Bob Fosse demonstrated his ability to do a backward aerial somersault, with astonishingly good amplitude. Here, he does it while facing the camera, in medium close shot, and it's extremely impressive. Unfortunately, Donen ruins the number with some gimmicky trick photography, speeding up the action and running it in reverse. After Debbie and Bob pop some brightly-coloured balloons, it's very weird to see the balloons unpopping themselves in reverse motion.Another number, called 'Applause', is pleasant. I also enjoyed 'Nothing Is Impossible', performed by the three men, which features a strange bit in which Gower Champion does a rapid tap dance with one foot while he keeps his other foot balanced on top of Bob Fosse's upright heel. The tubby actor Kurt Kasznar, who can't dance and can barely sing, shows some courage by performing a musical number with the athletic Champion and Fosse.There's a clever three-way dream sequence, in which each man envisions his own favoured lady's name appearing in lights above the theatre. But there's some clumsy dialogue involving the word 'palaver'. At the end of the movie, Marge Champion does a really ludicrous bit, in which she runs down the theatre gangway with her lips and her bosom thrust forward and her arms and her head thrown back. Corny!This is a good place to correct a misconception about Gower Champion: after a long career as a director of Broadway musicals, he supposedly died on the opening night of '42nd Street', his biggest hit. This was, of course, an extremely ironic death. ('42nd Street' is about a Broadway director who risks his own health in rehearsals while trying to make his biggest show a hit.) The truth is a bit less neat: Gower Champion actually died several days before his show opened, but producer David Merrick (recognising the publicity value of Champion's death) claimed on opening night that Champion had died earlier that day.I'll rate 'Give a Girl a Break' 6 out of 10, and I recommend it to you.