Huievest Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

Robert Joyner The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Teddie Blake The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Stephanie There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

TheLittleSongbird The Toast of New Orleans is a long way from perfect, but anybody who loves opera and classical music and who is a fan of Mario Lanza will enjoy it a lot. As a lifelong fan of opera and classical music and who likes Lanza's voice a great deal, The Toast of New Orleans was very enjoyable to me.As the review summary says, it's mainly the music and the performance of Mario Lanza that makes The Toast of New Orleans worth viewing. The music is just glorious, Be My Love became Lanza's signature song and not only is it a melodically beautiful song sung beautifully but it does stir up the emotions a fair bit. There are a number of operatic arias from the likes of Carmen and La Traviata(two of the finest operas ever written) and they are guaranteed to delight opera and musical fans. The Madama Butterfly duet scene is truly unforgettable. The music score is just lovely as well. Lanza as ever is in magnificent voice(one of the loveliest and most distinctive tenor voices ever) and proves himself to be a very likable leading man, his acting looking more comfortable than in his debut, That Midnight Kiss.Kathryn Grayson is by no means inferior, she radiates in charm and sings like an angel, while David Niven is wonderfully suave and Rita Moreno turns up in a super dance number, that's excitingly choreographed and exuberantly danced. The Toast of New Orleans also looks grand, with lavish sets and bright colourful costumes and the whole film is very lovingly photographed. The script is appropriately witty and amusing and has a good deal of heart.Where The Toast of New Orleans is let down is in the story, which again like That Midnight Kiss is silly and wafer-thin, except that the story is even more predictable than the story for that film and occasionally drags, I do agree that it's more an excuse to string as many operatic scenes together. J. Carrol Naish tries far too hard for laughs that he comes over as unfunny and obnoxious. Some of the more romantic scenes are a little cold as well, the Madama Butterfly duet is just fine in this regard but Lanza and Grayson's chemistry in That Midnight Kiss, from personal opinion, was warmer and more natural.All in all, a nice film and worth seeing for Lanza and the music. 7/10 Bethany Cox

weezeralfalfa This is a variation on the much repeated love story in which a cloistered upper class girl must choose between marrying a safe but dull man of her class or a dashing Romeo rogue. Examples include some of MGM's most popular films of the '30s and '40s,such as "Gone with the Wind", "Captain Blood" and "The Adventures of Robin Hood", as well as the poorly received musical "The Pirate". In "The Belle of New York", Fred Astaire's character incorporates both of these elements. Thus, the conflict for Vera Ellen involves trying to reformulate his character so as to bring out the best mix for her(every woman's fantasy!).That is also what this love story is about:making a gentleman as well as a talented opera singer out of a boisterous rough hewn bayou fisherman with a golden singing voice(Mario Lanza), without making him too dull and unromantic.The film begins with the festivities surrounding the annual blessing of the fishing fleet of a small early 20th century bayou fishing village. Evidently, the village mayor has contracted to have an opera star(Kathryn Grayson) and her manager/escort(David Niven) arrive for this festival. Mario spends too long looking at the beautiful Kathryn and grounds his uncle's boat so that they miss having it blessed with holy water: a bad omen, as things turn out. Mario wants to impress Kathryn the only way he knows how: by impulsively joining in her song, and later practically forcing her to join in the local folk dance. This makes Kathryn look foolish twice over. Is that any way to catch a woman of her upper class breeding? Certainly not, but subsequent events might make her change her mind. After his uncle's boat is wrecked in a storm, Mario reluctantly gives up fishing for a possible career as an opera singer.He is groomed as Kathryn's costar, but only after he gets an education on how to behave around upper class opera patrons. His relationship with Kathryn ocillates from cold to warm and back. She is a very difficult woman to consistently please or figure out! Meanwhile, they both do much singing, solo and as a duet, not actually a lot of heavy opera until the finale "Madame Butterfly" performance. At one point, Kathryn asks the unemotional Niven to marry her, apparently to resolve the conflict in her mind about how to respond to Mario's strong romantic overtures.Now, for the very puzzling behavior of Kathryn during and after their "Madame Butterfly" love duet. Obviously, she often looks very anguished and is trying to push Mario away during most of this performance, in contrast to what she should have been doing. Some have interpreted this as the real Kathryn reacting to the real Mario, reflecting her well known aversion to his advances toward her, garlic eating, and other rude behaviors between takes. I can't believe MGM would allow this to show so blatantly, although it may have been a contributing factor. Rather, I favor the following interpretation as being the dominant explanation: Before this performance, Kathryn, as well as several of Mario's village friends complain that he has become too much of a gentleman, afraid of showing his impulsive rogue persona that village girls found so irresistible. Basically, she's playing hard to get, again, hoping the old Mario will break through his gentlemanly facade to sweep her off her feet. Meanwhile, Mario has gotten a hint from Niven that he should do this. Symbolically,this happens in his forceful treatment of her during their duet, a subsequent chase around the stage area, and when he breaks through her locked dressing room. End of story. Yes, Kathryn's character was a complicated and difficult woman to fathom, which some reviewers interpret as bad acting. Not so!I found J Carrol Naish an entertaining and sometimes hilarious 'sidekick' for Mario, providing comedic relief throughout, along with the Mario-Kathryn unlikely pairing comedy. His character remained unimpressed with NO high society culture,refusing to be transformed by it, as Mario had been. Naish had been incorporated into several of Fox's high profile Latino-oriented musicals of the early '40s, again as a somewhat humorous supporting character. David Niven retains his British upper class reserve and charm throughout, as Kathryn's chaperon, overseer and probable lover: the alternative safe choice for Kathryn as a husband.

fedor8 More wide-eyed, hysterical 50s hyper-cheerfulness that gives new meaning to anti-social, pathological behaviour. Danza and Grayson will leave you begging for mercy.It's a shame that all the people involved in the making of this movie are now dead (or in nursing homes). I kinda thought about suing them for torture. As this movie started unleashing its shamelessly aggressive operatic assault onto my poor, defenseless ear-drums, I felt instant, strong pain envelop my entire being. That damn muscular vibrato can shatter Soviet tanks into tiny bits, nevermind glass."Why didn't you switch the channel if you didn't like it?", you might ask angrily. Fair point, fair point... The answer is that I wanted to, but the pain was so sudden and excruciating that I fell to the floor, writhing in agony. With my last ounces of energy, I tried to reach the remote but couldn't.A silly little fisherman with the questionable talent of singing with an annoying opera voice is discovered by Niven, who then proceeds to "pigmalionize" him. Lanza is in love with asymmetrical Grayson, but she predictably treats him with contempt until they finally hook up. This may seem like a rather thin plot, but this noisy movie is so chock-full of singing and music that there is barely any dialogue at all. This movie is RELENTLESS. Forget about torturing hippies and war prisoners with Slayer's "Reign In Blood" (as in a South Park episode). Whatever little conversation there is amongst the silly adults that infest this strange 50s musical world, it's all infantile - as if they were all 6 year-olds impersonating grown-ups. I can only envy people who find movies like this funny. It must be great being easy-to-please: what a world of wonder would open up to me if only I could enjoy any silly old gag as hilarious, gut-busting comedy. But let's examine this phenomenon, the 50s musical. My best guess is that 50s musicals offered the more day-dreaming idealists among us a glimpse into Utopia or Heaven (depending on whether you're church-going or Lenin's-tomb-going), or at least very cheesy version of these fantasy-inspired places. TTONO is more akin to a representation of Hell, but that's just me. I don't seem to "get" musicals. People talk, there is a story - but then all-of-a-sudden everyone starts singing for about 4 minutes after which they abruptly calm down and then pretend as if nothing unusual happened! When you think about it, musicals are stranger than any science-fiction film.Worse yet, TTONO (my favourite type of pizza, btw) is not just a 50s musical, but one with opera squealing. Opera is proof that there is such a thing as over-training a voice - to the point where it becomes an ear-piercing weapon rather than a means of bringing the listener pleasure. The clearest example of this travesty is when Lanza and Grayson unite their Dark Side vocal powers for a truly unbearable duet. I tried lowering the volume. I lowered it from 18 to 14. Then from 14 to 10. Then 8. I ended up lowering it to a 1, which is usually so low that it's only heard by specially-trained dogs and certain types of marsupials, and yet I STILL could hear those two braying like donkeys!Take the scene in the small boat in the river. Danza starts off with one of his deafening, brain-killing tunes, and then... nothing. No animals anywhere to be seen. Even the crocodiles, who are mostly deaf, have all but left. If you look carefully, you might even see the trees change colour, from green to yellow, in a matter of minutes. No, this was not a continuity error, it was plain old torture of the flora. And those trees were just matte paintings! Imagine how real trees would have reacted.The reason glass breaks when a high C is belched out of the overweight belly of an operatic screamer is not due to any laws of physics relating to waves and frequency, but because glass is only human - hence can take only so much pain before committing suicide through spontaneous self-explosion. I can listen to the loudest, least friendly death metal band for hours, but give me just a minute of a soprano and I get a splitting headache.

lastliberal Mario Lanza only did 10 movies, and only two with Kathryn Grayson. She could not get along wt him due to his temper and alcohol abuse. That is a real shame as the two together on the Oscar-nominated "Be My Love" was pure magic. (It lost to "Mona Lisa" in another crash of Academy voters.) Current moviegoers can hear Lanza sing in Zodiac or The Polar Express, but why settle for one song when you can enjoy a half dozen by this wonderful tenor.Those who think of Pavarotti when they think of tenors, will be surprised by Lanza's looks. He is more like Sly Stallone with good looks that the typical rotund singer.This movie was a joy to behold as it was funny and sweet. The great David Niven (Separate Tables, Eye of the Devil) was fantastic.