New York, New York (Special Edition) (DVD)

~~ NEW YORK, NEW YORK ~~

Another movie from my musical collection and believe it or not before this viewing I had never seen it before, so I had no idea what to expect. I was also quiet surprised that it was a relatively young film, compared to a lot of good musicals, it opened in America in 1977. I knew the song New York, New York by Frank Sinatra, but I had never heard of the film.

~~ The Film ~~

The ...
...
You Brought A New Kind Of Love To Me: This is the first song that shows the sparks of love between Francine and Jimmy as well as their musical talents. This song was originally song by Maurice Chevalier in the 1930 film The Big Pond and was written by Sammy Fain and Irving Kahal.

You Are My Lucky Star: A lovely production number with Francine singing with Frankie Harte's band, it is truly a lovely melody. The song was previous ... more

~~ NEW YORK, NEW YORK ~~

Another movie from my musical collection and believe it or not before this viewing I had never seen it before, so I had no idea what to expect. I was also quiet surprised that it was a relatively young film, compared to a lot of good musicals, it opened in America in 1977. I knew the song New York, New York by Frank Sinatra, but I had never heard of the film.

~~ The Film ~~

The movie tells the complicated love story of two very talented people, both having strong personalities and creative talents which don't always gel together. This makes for a loving yet turbulent relationship. It spans across a decade of their lives beginning just after World War II when music was also starting to go through some dramatic changes from the big band sounds and Jazz to the improvisations of be-bop.

It starts off at the beginning when 'the boy' Jimmy Doyle uses extremely corny and bad chat up lines to meet and woo 'the girl' Francine Evans. Jimmy (played by a very young Robert De Niro) comes across as an over the top Sax player; his first love is music, 2nd love is money and his 3rd is love. He can be very over bearing and pushy, if he does not get what he wants, he goes sulky and childish, but he still manages to win the heart of Francine.

You get to hear Jimmy play his sax very early on in the movie; he has dragged the reluctant Francine with him to the audition. Francine (played by Liza Minnelli) comes across as sub-missive around Jimmy, she seems to let him bully her into doing things his way, but it is obvious that she does this because she loves him by the sparkle in her eye. We get to hear her wonderful powerful voice (strong like her mothers Judy Garland) at the audition as she starts singing to help Jimmy get the job. Due to her intervention, the manager gives them both a job as a boy, girl act and they have to start work the next day; arrangements are made over a little bit of necking to meet up the next day.

Later that night Francine receives a call from her agent Tony Harwell to say that there is a better offer for her to join the Frankie Harte band on their latest tour. She had to leave straight away and left poor Jimmy in the lurch to start at the club on his own. Jimmy did not give up on Francine he spent months searching for her and when he did find her he took her completely by surprise and declared his love for her.

After realising their love for each other Jimmy joined the band and their life together began in earnest, with this we get to see some great swing numbers and jazz numbers; we also get to see the ups and downs of their family life and the clashes that occur in their respective careers, which although similar they both have their own unique style and artistic temperaments which can cause some interesting situations for them to over come. The film follows all these right to the finale when we find out if after a decade are they still together or not and what has happened to their musical career?

~~ Songs ~~

You Brought A New Kind Of Love To Me: This is the first song that shows the sparks of love between Francine and Jimmy as well as their musical talents. This song was originally song by Maurice Chevalier in the 1930 film The Big Pond and was written by Sammy Fain and Irving Kahal.

You Are My Lucky Star: A lovely production number with Francine singing with Frankie Harte's band, it is truly a lovely melody. The song was previous performed by Gene Kelly and Debbie Reynolds in Singin' In The Rain and was written by Arthur Freed.

The Man I Love: Francine has left the band and married Jimmy, the two of them have started their own band and this is a song where Francine sings about her hopes for the future for her and Jimmy. This song is a Gershwin number and has been covered by a few artists including Billy Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald.

Blue Moon: Francine has taken time out from the band to have a baby and this song is the one that introduces us to her replacement in the band Bernice Bennett, will she do as well? Personally I would have loved to have heard this song performed by Liza Minnelli as I feel she has the strength of voice to carry it off. Most people would that enjoy the music of this era would know the song Blue Moon written by Lorenz Hart.

There Goes The Ball Game: So Bernice is now the lead singer of the band, but Francine can't just sit around waiting for the baby so we find her in the studio recording a demo of this song. This was written by Fred Ebb.

Do Nothing 'Til You Hear From Me: Time has moved on and Francine is out for the evening and is asked to perform this song and once again we get to hear her magnificent voice. This song has been covered by some great people like Louis Armstrong and Nat King Cole.

Honeysuckle Rose: A jazzy number that comes at a crisis time between Francine and Jimmy; written by Andy Razaf.

But The World Goes Rounds: This is done as a montage suggesting Francine's growing fame; Lyrics by Fred Ebb.

Happy Endings: The opening of her new film and Francine is dressed as an usherette and singing about how happy endings are only for the stars. This is a big production number in the film; again the lyrics are by Fred Ebb.

New York, New York: Now who does not know this fantastic song which was made famous by the legendary Frank Sinatra? Liza Minnelli most definitely did this song justice with her powerful performance of it.

~~ Characters ~~

Liza Minnelli: Plays the female lead Francine Evans, she is a loving mother and wife with a strong personality, strong artistic temperament and a powerful voice.

Robert De Niro: Playing the male lead Jimmy Doyle, who has an extremely volatile personality, one minute he is up and well over the top in his behaviour, the next he, is throwing a tantrum like a small child.

Lionel Stander: Plays Tony Harwell, Francine's' agent and acts like a fatherly figure to her throughout the film. He also has a hard business head on his shoulders and realises the value of looking after Francine.

Barry Primus: Plays Paul Wilson, who is the pianist in the Frankie Harte Orchestra; there is one stage during the film that he takes over the running of band. Why I hear you ask? Well I would hate to spoil it for you so you will have to watch the film to find out.

Georgie Auld: As Frankie Harte the Big Band Leader that takes Francine on as his singer. He is a saxophone player in real life and also did the dubbing for De Niro's sax playing.

Mary Kay Place: As Bernice Bennett who takes over from Francine when she leaves the band to have her baby.

Lenny Gaines: As Artie Kirks who is the man from Decca records; he helps move Francine from the stage into the recording studios and ultimately into the film industry.

Clarence Clemons: Plays Cecil Powell the Harlem Trumpeter with the Dizzy Gillespie Style.

Director of this movie is Martin Scorsese.

Producers are: Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff

~~ Trivia ~~

When the movie was first released it sadly upset some of the public as it did not follow the traditional musical era, it also managed to upset the De Niro fan base as they expected it to be a film like Taxi Driver which he appeared in a few years before. It simply just failed to meet people's expectations which is probably why it slipped into the background.

Robert De Niro had to be trained to mimic the saxophone being played; he appeared to do it extremely well in my opinion.

~~ Conclusion ~~

It is not surprising really that this film was missed by as it was released in 1977 the same year as Blockbuster movies such as Star Wars, Rocky and Saturday Night Fever which rocked the box offices. It was also the year that Elvis Presley died as well as Groucho Marx, Charlie Chaplin and Bing Crosby.

It was the year I was enjoying discos, growing up and preparing to leave school, so I missed this glorious movie then, but in fairness I don't think I would have enjoyed it as much then as I do now; I don't think I had the maturity then to appreciate the movie, but now as a middle aged lady I simply adore Liza's powerful vocals and appreciate the time and effort De Niro put in to make us believe he was playing the Saxophone.

The storyline was pretty dramatic at times and did well to show off the artistic temperaments and the struggles that they faced to love each other and love their careers and expand their self development.

The film really surprised me, the way it dragged me in and made me enjoy it; I will admit I was totally expecting it to be a bit of a disaster as I had not heard of it before, but it truly took me by surprise, it was not that bad; I just feel that if it had been made a decade earlier it may have been a more successful movie, but even then it would have had a lot of competition as the world was moving fast and there was a lot of changes during the 60's and 70's, with people's expectations getting higher.

If you enjoy good music and enjoy a love story, then this is a movie you will enjoy, it is not likely to send you hunting for the tissues, you are more likely to get frustrated and find yourself shouting at the telly to tell them to grow up and be nice to each other (oops that's what I did), it is definitely worth a viewing if only the once.

I have to add a little extra to my conclusion as I have since done a little bit of searching on the internet and found a review on this movie giving a total opposite opinion to mine. The review I found totally hated the movie, it did not have a nice thing to say about De Niro or Minnelli, so maybe I am easily pleased, or maybe it is just down to the viewers' perception. I admit that it is not a classic and maybe not in the same category as the Rogers and Hammerstein's musicals, but to me it was a pleasant movie to watch and I enjoyed it for what it was.

~~ EXTRAS ~~

Martin Scorsese's Introduction to New York, New York: this is a short interview about his views on the film which lasts approx 5 mins

Language Options: Not much options in spoken options you have the choices of English, French, Polish and Castellano.

Subtitles - gives you 8 options including English.

You have the options also of having an Audio Commentary with the director Martin Scorsese and the film critic Carrie Rickey talking you through the film.

When the movie starts you get the choice of the cut version or the uncut version (there was 20mins cut out for 1st option).

Finally you get the choice of scene selections which you get with most dvd's.

There is a section where you can view any of the 15 alternative takes or deleted scenes.

The Photo Gallery is just like others I have seen in the extras where you get to see various stills and photos of the scenes and casts; including also promotional posters.

You also get the opportunity to see the original publicity trailers for the film.

As you can see that there are not many extras to share with you, which is a big shame as I really do enjoy the extras they put with a lot of movies.

You can buy the dvd for around £4.99 in the UK

Thanks for reading

Lyn x 

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