Cheap Brigadoon (DVD) (Gene Kelly, Van Johnson) (Vincente Minnelli) Price

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Customer Reviews of Brigadoon

While Brigadoon is certainly not a great musical, it's quite charming. The songs aren't as good as those in later Lerner&Loewe musicals, but some still are pretty good, such as "Go Home With Bonnie Jean", "Almost Like Being in Love", and "The Heather on the Hill". The film does take a while to really get going. And yes, Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse don't give their finest performances here, but are quite fine anyway. They make a good couple, and their romance is believeable. Van Johnson is pretty funny, too. Even though the movie was filmed on sets, not in Scotland like Kelly and Vincente Minnelli wanted, the scenery still looks okay, and besides, lots of movies were fimed on sets back then, anyway. Really, there's just something about this film that's very charming, even if it isn't great cinema.

Scotland the Bland
MGM expected BRIGADOON to be their box-office musical smash of 1954--and for good reason: the film was based on an early play by Broadway's Learner and Lowe and includes some captivating music in a winsome tale of two 20th Century hunters who stumble into a Scottish village that magically appears for one day once every hundred years. But MGM hadn't reckoned that film audiences would respond to the movie precisely as Broadway audiences had several years earlier: they stayed away.

BRIGADOON is not a bad film. It is well-crafted in true MGM fashion. The score, which includes such favorites as "Almost Like Being In Love," is quite fine. The cast--which includes Gene Kelly, Cyd Charisse, and Van Johnson--is superior, the musical numbers are enjoyably staged, and although not one of his finest efforts the film bears the imprint of director Vincent Minnelli's famous touch. On the other hand, BRIGADOON is not a particularly enjoyable , exciting, or memorable film and the fanciful story is so sweetly presented that it quickly becomes off-putting. While individual songs in the score are brilliant, when heard collectively they have a sameness of tone that creates a repetitive feel. Most musical fans will enjoy seeing the film once--after all, Kelly and Charisse are a handsome pair and they dance extremely well together. But only those who like their musicals bland, extra-sweet, and with sugar on the side will care for a second helping.

awesome
My Life, and a great song called Come to Me Bend to Me. Almost Like Being In Love is in the Campbell house, and Waitin' for My Deary isn't. Tommy and Jeff aren't in Bonnie Jean and there's more to Meg Brockie than what they have in the movie. And the Campbell family is actually the McLaren family. There's a sword dance before the reel and Tommy and Fiona don't do as much dancing as they did.
But enough of the differences between stage and movie. It is an awesome movie, full or great, catchy songs and great dancing. My friends and I who were in it always got Bonnie Jean stuck in everybody'shead and who couldn't like Gene Kelly singing "Almost Like Being in Love"? If you just watch the movie and not the play, then it is awesome. It shows true love is out there, you just don't know where you'll find it. And that "the hardest part in life is giving up everything, but that's the only way you'll get everything."