Film

Ziegfeld Follies

A 1945 revue imagining what Ziegfeld would create from heaven: a parade of musical numbers, comedy sketches, and dance sequences strung together by the thinnest plot. It's a visual banquet that asks nothing of you except to sit still and enjoy the talent. For anyone who loves watching virtuosos work.

TMDb rating3.0

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you love old-fashioned stagecraft, a parade of lavish sets and bright sketches where the pleasure lies in the showmanship rather than a through-line.

Skip it if you need a single story pulling you along, since this is a loose run of unconnected numbers and skits whose quality swings from dazzling to fiddly.

What it asks of you: Long at 110 minutes and built from separate turns, it wants patience, and it takes its dated sentiment and theatrical excess on its own terms.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Singin' in the Rain1952

The gold standard of movie musicals, with Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor delivering infectious charm, jaw-dropping dance, and actual narrative momentum. Every number feels essential.

But If pure spectacle without emotional stakes leaves you cold, the plot is gossamer-thin and exists only to hang songs on.

Singin' in the Rain poster

An American in Paris1951

Gershwin's genius, Leslie Caron's elegance, and Gene Kelly at his peak dancing through a gorgeously realized Paris. The finale is a full-length ballet that justifies the entire enterprise.

But It's very long and sometimes pauses for extended stretches of pure dance when you might want the story to move.

An American in Paris poster

Swing Time1936

Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in their element: witty banter, impeccable dancing, and a soundtrack by Kern and Berlin. Proof that musicals can be genuinely funny and romantic at once.

But The story is fluff, and the racial politics of the 1930s haven't aged well—there's a blackface number that will make you wince.

Swing Time poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Ziegfeld Follies

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Phantom Lady1944

Same year, same studio (MGM), same era—but Phantom Lady shows the noir shadow behind the musical revue's bright surface. Both traffic in artifice and performance, but one uses it to seduce you and one uses it to confuse you.

A noir thriller with one of cinema's great set pieces: a wild-eyed drum solo in a jazz club that turns into sexual tension and murder plot. Robert Siodmak directed; Ella Raines is magnetic.

But It's genuinely dark and cynical—nothing like the bright spectacle of Ziegfeld—and the plot, while gripping, hinges on a woman's trauma and gaslighting.

Phantom Lady poster
More like this (8)

The Band Wagon1953

Fred Astaire again, alongside Cyd Charisse in numbers that are dizzyingly inventive. The self-aware humor about Broadway works better than it has any right to.

But The middle sags under a plot nobody cares about, and some comedy bits land softer than others.

The Band Wagon poster

Funny Girl1968

Barbra Streisand's film debut, playing real entertainer Fanny Brice with force and vulnerability. The numbers crackle, and she commands every frame.

But The second half pivots into dramedy about a failing marriage, abandoning the musical energy you came for.

Funny Girl poster

Easter Parade1948

Fred Astaire and Judy Garland together, Irving Berlin songs, and enough tap dancing and charm to sustain two hours. Lightweight but irresistible.

But It's thin even by revue standards, and hasn't aged as gracefully as other Astaire films.

Easter Parade poster

Yankee Doodle Dandy1942

James Cagney playing George M. Cohan with electrifying energy and genuine theatrical savvy. It's a biopic with a pulse, shot through with performance.

But Cohan himself was a difficult man, and the film elides that in favor of pure celebration.

Yankee Doodle Dandy poster

The Pirate1948

Gene Kelly and Judy Garland with Cole Porter songs and a weirdly experimental approach to the musical—high-concept, playful, sometimes surreal.

But The experimentalism doesn't always work, and the tone whipsaws between camp and sentimentality.

The Pirate poster

Cover Girl1944

Rita Hayworth, Phil Silvers, and Rita's own dancing in a Technicolor romance set in the world of fashion magazines. Pure escapism.

But It's a thin romantic plot, and Hayworth's not a natural actress—the film survives on her presence alone.

Cover Girl poster

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes1953

Ziegfeld Follies and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes are both revues where the plot barely exists—but Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is sharper, meaner, and more self-aware about what its spectacle is selling.

Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe in what is essentially a revue disguised as a plot, with musical numbers staged as pure fantasy. Monroe's 'Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend' is canonical.

But The humor is broad and sometimes relies on stereotypes of women. It can feel more knowing about its own objectification than critical of it.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes poster

La Bête Humaine1938

Both 1940s entertainment films, but Renoir's is what happens when you apply the intensity of real desire and real stakes to Ziegfeld's world of surfaces. It's the darkness underneath the song and dance.

Jean Renoir's masterpiece: a railway noir where passion and class collide. Simone Simon and Jean Gabin smolder with real erotic charge; the film moves like a express train.

But It's in French, it moves at 1938 pace, and it ends in genuine tragedy—about as far from escapist revue as cinema goes.

La Bête Humaine poster

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