ChicRawIdol A brilliant film that helped define a genre

FuzzyTagz If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

Yazmin Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

kijii Carmen Jones (Dorothy Dandridge) is great as a tempestuous she-devil, tempting and playing around with straight-shooting Joe (Harry Belafonte) as he prepares to go to flight school at a Southern army camp during World War II. The two meet at the camp where Carmen also works. When she gets in trouble, Joe's Sergeant (Brock Peters) makes Joe escort Carmen to a civilian court for trial. But, taking care of Carmen is more than he is capable of. First, she coaxes him to her hometown. Then she coaxes him to Chicago to see Husky Miller's boxing match with some of Husky's groupies, including Frankie (Pearl Bailey) and Myrt (Diahan Carroll).In the title role, Dorothy Dandridge, was the first black woman to be nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award. The movie is loaded with many other "firsts": first all-black cast in a color CinemaScope musical, first musical adaptation of Bizet's opera with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstien, and the first musical directed by Otto Preminger.Carmen Jones is great musical, full of fun, dancing, and song, and I was happy to see some of the old black stereotypes broken. For example, most speech and behavior patterns seemed more natural and fluid to me as a white person. One has a feeling that this movie is fairly up to date for the 1940s--unlike Porgy and Bess which was a Gershwin opera set in a poor black fishing village in 1912 South Carolina.In spite of all of its superlatives, the movie does seem somewhat disjointed at times—hard to explain.. However, I think Dandridge's performance was worthy of an Oscar.

nbbaiyuchen I did enjoy the movie, even when I was just kind of listening to the music. It was Bizet, after all, even if they'd let Oscar Hammerstein loose all over the words. And it may not've actually been Dorothy Dandridge or Harry Belafonte singing, but the people dubbing their voices were, obviously, quite good. And, as we know, more operatic and therefore befitting the Bizet. The filming's good, too. The trailer refers to the "interesting people and colorful places" of the United States, presumably because it would've been a tacky to refer to the colorful people in a situation like this one. And certainly the places are colorful, even if--as is the case in the flophouse in Chicago--that color is grey.

gavin6942 Contemporary version of the Bizet opera, with new lyrics and an African-American cast.Most critics loved it, but Channel 4 called it "a truly dreadful film. Preminger can't be faulted for ambition, but for once, his execution is sorely lacking... Dandridge's tough, hip-swinging, steely eyed Carmen goes some way to redeeming things, but the part is too fractured by the imposition of another singing voice, bad dubbing, and the alien tone of the songs." In 1992, Carmen Jones was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". Indeed, it has earned this -- a film adaptation of a play adaptation of an opera. And one of the first big films with an all-black cast. That was ground-breaking in the 1950s.For me, I did not really get into it. But that was because this really is not my kind of music. For those who like "Carmen", you may love this movie.

Jay Raskin In Hollywood movies from 1920-1960, African-Americans were typically given small parts, usually comical, as servants or lower-class workers (shoe shine boys and train porters) which reflected the view of the dominant Euro-American society. They were also portrayed as marvelous singers and dancers in shorts and occasional entertainer roles.Occasionally, there would be an all black movies where all the characters were black living in an all black world ("Hallelujah," "Cabin in the Sky" etc.) Here, the world of blacks was portrayed as essentially a closed white world. It was separate but equal to the white world. Both of these views could be considered racist because neither of them showed the dominant problem of racism that made life a living hell for so many African-Americans in those years. Racism is virtually non-existent in the movie world of this period (with notable exceptions, see for example, "The Killing," Kubrick, 1954) Yet both views also contain contradictions. The blacks as funny servants view did show that blacks and whites could laugh together at the same things, and the separate-but-equal society view showed that they were fully human and could cry and be hurt as everyone."Carmen Jones" shows a separate-but-equal view of blacks. The problems in the movie are generated exclusively by the free decisions of the leading characters. Racism does not exist in this world.The movie has a wonderful cast, with the leads, Harry Belafonte and Dorothy Dandridge giving top notch performances. Belafonte could certainly have been as big as Marlon Brando as an actor if not for the racism of the period. Likewise, Dorothy Dandridge only did four more Hollywood films before her untimely death in 1965. Consider that an equivalent "sexy" actress, Kim Novak, who started her career the same year, appeared in seventeen moves during this time period.The production is excellent, nice sets, costumes, cinematography and editing. The two problems with the movie are the dubbing and the plot. The dubbing of opera singers for the singing of the main characters was a common mistake made often. Technically the singing may be better, but you always get a slight out-of-sync feeling that is slightly unpleasant. The plot is also a problem in that it moves from absolute lightness and comedy in the first half to a quite serious drama in the second half. The abrupt transition doesn't work. Since the language and setting of the original opera by Bizet are changed, I do not think it would have been out of place to change the ending.Still, its a fascinating piece, worth watching for a number of reasons.Incidentally, it was a pleasure seeing Nick Stewart in a small role. He played the delightful and hilarious character "Ligthnin" in the "Amos and Andy" television series of the time. He was a great comedian who should also have gotten more and bigger roles.