New subtitles have been added to several of the earliest movies in this collection.
I found myself modifying my own system. I not only removed the narrative part of
these movies, while retaining only the song and dance parts, but I found myself not
liking this result. Many of the numbers are themselves uninteresting.
So, to show you what I've done, I'm including all stages of my winnowing down the
original to my final liking. My catagory 3 is the final step which satisfies me.
Gold Diggers of 1935 is a good example of this. I find it hard to understand what
the rationale was for them to include a death, or suicide, in what should have
been a rousing, inspiriational musical number. Perhaps it was merely an excuse to
lead up to the spiraling down into the clock scene.
I spent most of my time concentrating on the two military numbers in Footlight
Parade and Gold Diggers of 1933. I think they're marvelous. I am particularly
moved by My Forgotten Man. I came from that time. I am an 85 year old veteran of
both World War II and The Korean War.