weezeralfalfa
From one perspective, essentially a rip off of the prior Judy Garland-starring "The Harvey Girls", which was sited in Arizona, while this one was sited primarily in Skagway Alaska and Dawson City, Yukon Territory, although it was actually filmed at Paramount Studios. "The Harvey Girls" was based on a historical group known as the Harvey Girls, whereas the present film has no historical basis. In both films, we have a group of women, mostly marriageable straight-laced girls, who come into a frontier town, where most of the women are employed in a saloon. Pretty soon, they find themselves at odds with the co-proprietors of the saloon. In both films, the lesser proprietor takes drastic steps to encourage them to leave or tone down their antagonistic attitude. In both cases, part of this defense includes burning down part or all of the girl's work place. In both films, the leading lady has a love/hate relationship with the primary saloon proprietor, beginning mostly with hate and ending up mostly love, according to standard formula. In "The Harvey Girls", the girls run a sober restaurant, which is meant to compete with the saloon for customers. In the present film, the women eventually run the local newspaper that their father/husband died for, at the hands of the lesser saloon proprietor.Among other things, this film can be considered a musical, featuring 5 songs, we having 5 professional singers. Best remembered of these singers is Teresa Brewer, who participates in 3 of the songs. "Baby, Baby, Baby" is a solo, done on stage in Dawson. Early on, she sings and frolics around her bedroom in a fancy outfit to "Mr. Banjo Man". Later, Rhonda Fleming, and the older of The Bell Sisters singing group, join Teresa in singing and frolicking around. I will remember this scene long after I've forgotten the other scenes in this film. Teresa also took turns with Guy Mitchell in singing "I Guess it was You all the Time", on stage. Guy had a solo on stage with "Chick-a-Boom". On the boat from Seattle to Skagway, the Bell Sisters entertained the passengers singing and frolicking to "Take Back Your Gold". They sounded exactly like the Andrew Sisters, to me, in spite of having one less singer. Unfortunately, this was Teresa's only Hollywood film, and one of only two appearances for The Bell Sisters. Teresa was offered a film contract, but decided her singing career and growing family was more important. Latter, she would second guess this decision. She certainly had the all around talent and looks to be a big film star.Gene Barry played Johnny Kisco, chief saloon proprietor, while John Kellogg played Mike Yurkil, his partner and main badman of the film. Guy Mitchell played Joe, who worked for Johnny until the animosity between the Edmonds women and the saloon personnel escalated. He and Connie had formed a romantic attachment, so he decided to work for their newspaper. Agnes Moorehead played Mrs. Edmonds. Along with 3 of her 4 daughters, she had reddish or red-brown hair. Nell was a blond, as well as appearing to be younger than the others. She failed to warn the other girls of the arrival of their mother, thus one said "You can't trust a blond". Frank Wilcox played Vance Edmonds, who was only present for a short time before being executed by Yurkil. Walter Reed plays Whitey, who buys the Klondike Club from Johnny, after the latter got tired of being written up in the newspaper for doing bad things. He decided to take a boat for Fairbanks, where Yurkil was reported to have gone. He wanted to have Yurkil arrested for murder and arson. But, remember Yurkil was now in a US territory, whereas he committed these crimes in a Canadian territory. Strange that Yurkil's new partner in Fairbanks tells Johnny where Yurkil has wandered off to, after Johnny tells him why he wants to see Yurkil. Socks him on the chin to knock him out, so it looks like he made his partner tell him Yurkil's location.In summary, I see this as an interesting musical drama, with a few continuity and reality problems. It's especially valued as a unique chance to see Teresa Brewer sing, frolic, and act.
morrison-dylan-fan
With Easter coming up I started looking round for films to watch with my dad over the holiday season.Taking a look at a DVD seller page,I spotted the first ever 3D Musical Western (!) ,which led to me getting ready to meet the redheads of Seattle.The plot:Running a campaign in his newspaper to get Johnny Kisco's salon shutdown, Vance Edmonds newspaper business gets burnt to the ground by Kisco's henchmen.Thanks to their being a gold rush in the area,Edmounds writes a letter to his family telling them to come down.Shortly after sending the letter,Vance is killed by Kisco's handyman (who have not been ordered by Kisco to burn the building,or kill Vance.) Getting the letter, Mrs. Edmonds gathers her daughters and sets off to the city to be reunited with her husband. Arriving in the city completely unaware,the Edmonds soon receive some bad news. View on the film:Whilst the transfer from 3D to 2D, (the 3D version was shown at the premiere,then never shown again,talk about value for money!)does slightly mute the colours,co-writer/(along with Daniel Mainwaring & George Worthing Yates) director Lewis R. Foster and cinematographer Lionel Lindon are able to find glitz in the redheads.Foster greets the girls in rosy blues and greens,whilst Lindon offers a glimpse to the 3D take with a depth of field which give the salons a touch of glamour,and the great snow covered mountain final a frosty atmosphere.Joined by sweet songs from Sidney Cutner and Leo Shuken,the screenplay by Foster/Mainwaring and Yates neatly blends the light Musical glaze with sawn-off shots from the Western.Entering the town all elegant,the writers rub the Musical girls against the outlaw,double-dealing world of the west,by wonderfully throwing their limelight dreams into the seedy smoke of the salons.Keeping the family in line, Agnes Moorehead gives a very good performance as the level-headed Mrs. Edmonds,whilst Gene Barry terrifically reveals Kisco trying to keep his outlaw life hidden,as Kisco's head is turned by the girls from Seattle.
bkoganbing
Paramount's Dollar Bills, William Pine and William Thomas continued putting out films in the Fifties as they did in the Forties for Paramount's B picture unit. Only they were given a bit more bucks to play with and some bigger stars in the Fifties. For Those Redheads From Seattle they got not only color, but also 3-D making it the first musical released in 3-D.With some elements of The Harvey Girls as part of the story, Pine-Thomas could have used some better songs for the score. I noted that several different writers contributed to this one. Usually you have only one team, maybe an interpolation from another writer for the score. But in Those Redheads From Seattle it was all original material. It was like some various songwriting teams just opened the trunk for some unused material and sold it to Paramount.As one of those redheads is Rhonda Fleming who is the oldest of Agnes Moorehead's four daughters who have come to the city of Dawson in the Klondike Gold Rush you certainly have the redhead covered. Agnes is a redhead her and so are Teresa Brewer and the Bell Sisters except one of them is a blond and wonders how she got in this family. No exceptions were allowed in the Day Family in Life With Father. They got a last letter from their husband and father who ran the newspaper in Dawson and is leading a fight to clean up the bad elements in Dawson. Then one of those bad elements plugs Frank Wilcox, but not before his family has pulled up from Seattle to join him. Another of those bad elements is the owner of the largest gambling palace in Dawson Gene Barry. He's thought of as the one responsible for Wilcox no longer being among the living. He has the whole film to prove himself innocent and gain one of the daughters as a bride.Taking care of the musical chores are Guy Mitchell who sings in Barry's establishment and Teresa Brewer who would like to. Nothing here that stands out in the score. 3-D was also used by MGM for Kiss Me Kate. If you can see that in 3-D I'd recommend it before Those Redheads From Seattle.
