MISSISSIPPI: A 1935 REVIEW

Here is the original review of the 1935 film Mississippi which paired Bing up with WC Fields. This was written by Andrew Sennwald and published in the New York Times on April 18, 1935...

THE SCREEN; W.C. Fields Joins Hands With Bing Crosby in the Paramount's Easter Attraction "Mississippi."..,

Amid an atmosphere of magnolia, crinoline and Kentucky whisky, the boozy genius of Mr. Fields and the subterranean croon of Mr. Crosby strike a happy compromise in "Mississippi," the new film at the Paramount Theatre. Having its money on Mr. Fields, this column considered the photo play only pleasant when he wasn't around, preferring during those interludes to remember how the Commodore of the River Queen shuddered with ecstasy in the grip of a mint julep or how he looked when he drew the five aces. But that, as Jimmy Durante would say, is ingratitood "Mississippi" is a tuneful and diverting show even when it isn't being particularly hilarious, and it is madly funny at sufficient length to satisfy us Fields idolaters. The Paramount has served its Easter Week clientele generously.

Naturally, it is Bill Fields, the beery aristocrat of the river, the bogus Indian fighter, the prodigious quaffer of rum, the greatest liar afloat, who provides the entertainment with its memorable moments. You ought to be told about that marvelous poker game in which the Commodore, surrounded by Southern gentlemen and primed pistols, deals himself five aces and then makes desperate and fruitless efforts to reduce his holding to the more orthodox four. Then there are some hoary but reliable monkeyshines about the cigar-store Indians who invade the dazed vision of the Commodore like a tribe of authentic redskins in quest of scalps, causing him to seek a hasty refuge in a bottle of bourbon, which he dilutes with two timid spurts of soda.

A good-natured burlesque of the old Mississippi dueling code, freely adapted from Booth Tarkmgton's "Magnolia," the film tells about the soft-spoken lad from Philadelphia who is about to marry into a Kentucky family. When he declines to fight a duel for his lady's honor he is sent off scornfully into the night, despite his sensible plea that the proposed affair of honor is somewhat lacking in motivation. So he joins Commodore Jackson's showboat troupe on the River Queen. Under that gentleman's tutelage he acquires a considerable paper reputation as a dead shot and soon is being billed as The Notorious Colonel Blake, the Singing Killer. Then he falls in love with Miss Joan Bennett, the sympathetic younger sister of his former fiancee, and finally bullies the Kentucky aristocracy into a cocked hat.

Mr. Crosby, who is a personable light comedian as well as a husky-voiced master of the croon, makes an excellent partner for Mr. Fields. Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart have composed some appropriate romantic numbers for him. Miss Bennett, modest and charming in her pantalettes, is admirably suited to the demure requirements of her part Queenie Smith appears rather too briefly as one of the belles of the River Queen. Concealed behind goatees, ten-gallon hats, stogies and itching pistols, you will find such reliable performers as Claude Gillingwater, Fred Kohler, John Miljan and Ed Pawley. But the spot news in Forty-third Street concerns Mr. Fields. "Women," he proclaims in one of his numerous oratorical flights, "are like elephants to me. They are all right to look at, but I wouldn't like to own one."

SOURCE

MOVIE REVIEW: MISSISSIPPI

It has been a long time since I had the time to sit down and watch a Bing Crosby movie all the way through. When I finally got a little bit of time to do so, I picked a film I had not seen since I was a little boy watching it as an afternoon movie. I wanted to rewatch the early Bing film - Mississippi (1935). The film was a delightful pairing of singer Bing Crosby and master comedian W.C. Fields. The film marked the first "costume movie for the crooner, and the plot was better than any film Bing had mad up to that time.

Commodore Jackson (W. C. Fields) is the captain of a Mississippi showboat in the late nineteenth century. Tom Grayson (Bing Crosby) is engaged to be married and has been disgraced for refusing to fight a duel with Major Patterson (John Miljan). Accused of being a coward, Grayson joins Jackson's showboat. Over the duration of the film, the behaviour of the meek and mild Tom Grayson alters as a consequence of the constant representation of him, by Commodore Jackson, as "The Notorious Colonel Steele", "the Singing Killer", and the constant attribution, by Jackson, of duelling victories by Grayson to unrelated corpses freshly dragged from the river beside the showboat as "yet another victim of the notorious Colonel Steele, the Singing Killer".

The film provides sufficient opportunities for Crosby to sing the Rodgers and Hart songs, including the centerpiece number, "Soon", while Fields gets to tell some outlandish stories.

Crosby and Fields worked well together and there is one memorable scene in which Fields tries to tell Crosby how to act tougher. In the film, Crosby does a number of brilliantly engineered sight gags involving a chair and a bowie knife. Another highlight is Fields' remarkable story about his exploits among one notorious Indian tribe.

The score by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart is good, but not great as compared to their Broadway score. Supposedly Bing did not like the many of the songs that the team had written, and many of them were cut. My personal favorite number though is "Down By The River". Bing in 1935 had such a strong voice that he sang it in nearly the operatic range. I am so glad this film is finally out on DVD, because you can tell by the print in some parts that the film was not saved properly through the years. The plot and the roles that the African-American actors had in the film is quite dated by today's standards, but the film was made in 1935. I enjoyed it immensely here in 2013...

MY RATING: 8 OUT OF 10

QUOTING BING

To hear Bing Crosby talk was almost as great as to hear him sing. He had such a command of the English language. Here are some quotes and sayings attributed to Bing. Whether or not he said them all may never be known, but his he had a way with words...

(his reported last words) "That was a great game of golf, fellas."

"Frank (Frank Sinatra) is a singer who comes along once in a lifetime, but why did he have to come in mine?"

"I think popular music in this country is one of the few things in the 20th century that have made great strides in reverse."

"Everyone knows I`m just a big, good-natured slob."

"Honestly, I think I`ve stretched a talent which is so thin it`s almost transparent over a quite unbelievable term of years."

(his own epitaph) "He was an average guy who could carry a tune."

"Once or twice I`ve been described as a light comedian. I consider this the most accurate description of my abilities I`ve ever seen."

(in 1954) "I don`t sing anywhere as good as I used to, and I feel sincerely that it`s getting worse. I don`t see any purpose in trying to stretch something out that was once acceptable and that now is merely adequate, if that."

(on Bob Hope) "Hope? He`s got more money on him than most people have in banks"

(on Judy Garland) "The most talented woman I ever knew was Judy Garland. She was a great, great comedienne and she could do more things than any girl I ever knew. Act, sing, dance, make you laugh. She was everything. I had a great affection for her. Such a tragedy. Too much work, too much pressure, the wrong kind of people as husbands."

(on W.C. Fields) "His comedy routines appeared spontaneous and improvised, but he spent much time perfecting them. He knew exactly what he was doing every moment, and what each prop was supposed to do. That "my little chickadee" way of talking of his was natural."

(on Fred Astaire) "When you`re in a picture with Astaire, you`ve got rocks in your head if you do much dancing. He`s so quick-footed and so light that it`s impossible not to look like a hay-digger compared with him."

(on Grace Kelly) "She`s a great lady, with great talent and kind, considerate, friendly with everybody. She was great with the crew and they all loved her."

(on his phenomenally successful single "White Christmas") "A jackdaw with a cleft palate could have sung it successfully."

"My golf is woeful but I will never surrender."

"Unless we make Christmas an occasion to share our blessings, all the snow in Alaska won`t make it white."

"There is nothing in the world I wouldn`t do for Hope, and there is nothing he wouldn`t do for me... We spend our lives doing nothing for each other."

"Aloha on the steel guitar"