Meet Me in St. Louis

A lot of the Hollywood studios during the War years made these nostalgic films about a simpler time when no foreign foe threatened our way of life. MGM's contribution to these films was not bettered served than by Meet Me In St. Louis. It's a simple story about the Smith family in 1904 St. Louis eagerly awaiting the World's Fair that would take place in their town. And to my knowledge no other World's Fair had as enduring a theme song as the one written for this fair, serving as the title song for the film. The Smith family consists of parents Leon Ames and Mary Astor and their five children, son Henry Daniels, Jr. and daughters in descending order, Lucille Bremer, Judy Garland, Joan Carroll, and Margaret O'Brien. Grandfather Harry Davenport lives with the clan and so does live-in maid Marjorie Main who functions like Alice in the Brady household. A good meal and an occasional wisecrack to keep everyone in line. Everyone's excited about the upcoming fair, St. Louis's rival city Chicago had one a decade earlier and Buffalo did three years earlier, but this one promises to be the most extravagant of all. Ames gets an opportunity in business and wants to move the family to New York, but one by one the family has or develops obligations and ties to St. Louis that makes them reluctant to leave. Not to mention they don't want to miss the fair. Vincente Minnelli directed Meet Me In St. Louis and it was his first opportunity to work with Judy Garland whom he would marry after the film was finished. Judy got to do three of her most identified songs from the Hugh Martin-Ralph Blane score that was blended with some traditional music of the times. The Boy Next Door, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, and The Trolley Song all come out of Meet Me In St. Louis and were staple items at Garland concerts for years. One of the Oscar nominations that Meet Me In St. Louis received was for The Trolley Song for Best Original Song. It lost to Bing Crosby's Swinging On A Star that year. The other nominations were for musical scoring, color cinematography, and screenplay. Margaret O'Brien did a remarkable job in this film, this was probably her best role while a child star at MGM. Not that she was the youngest and most appealing of the kids, she was that. But Minnelli did a great job in directing her. She had all the fears and trepidations of a child growing up and not wanting to leave all she's known and loved in St. Louis. Her acting reached its zenith in the scene where she destroys the carefully made snowmen in her yard and in the Halloween scene where she is induced to play a practical joke on a neighbor the rest of the kids regard as scary. Her number with Judy Garland, Under The Bamboo Tree is a gem. Meet Me In St. Louis was one of the earliest and best films coming out of the Arthur Freed unit at MGM. It was films like these that gave the Freed unit and MGM its reputation for turning out the best in musical film entertainment. It can never be duplicated because you don't have studios with all that talent under contract. In its way the film itself is as nostalgic as the time it celebrates. I guarantee your heart strings will go Zing Zing Zing as you hear Judy Garland sing the score from Meet Me In St. Louis.

source: Meet Me in St. Louis

BEWARE OF FALSE REVIEWS & REVIEWERS. SOME REVIEWERS HAVE ONLY ONE REVIEW TO THEIR NAME. NOW WHEN ITS A POSITIVE REVIEW THAT TELLS ME THEY WERE INVOLVED WITH THE MOVIE. IF ITS A NEGATIVE REVIEW THEN THEY MIGHT HAVE A GRUDGE AGAINST THE FILM . NOW I HAVE REVIEWED OVER 300 HOLIDAY FILMS & SPECIALS. I HAVE NO AGENDA The backdrop for Meet Me in St. Louis is St. Louis, Missouri in the year leading up to the 1904 World's Fair. It is summer 1903. The Smith family leads a comfortable upper-middle class life. Alonzo Smith (Leon Ames) and his wife Anna (Mary Astor) have four daughters: Rose (Lucille Bremer), Esther (Judy Garland), Agnes (Joan Carroll), and Tootie (Margaret O'Brien); and a son, Lon Jr. (Henry H. Daniels, Jr.). Esther, the second eldest daughter, is in love with the boy next door, John Truett (Tom Drake), although he does not notice her at first. Rose is expecting a phone call in which she hopes to be proposed to by Warren Sheffield (Robert Sully). Esther finally gets to meet John properly when he is a guest at the Smiths' house party, although her chances of romancing him don't go to plan when, after all the guests are gone and he is helping her turn off the gas lamps throughout the house, he tells her she uses the same perfume as his grandmother and that she has "a mighty strong grip for a girl". Esther hopes to meet John again the following Friday on a trolley ride from the city to the construction site of the World Fair. Esther is sad when the trolley sets off without any sign of him, but cheers up when she sees him running to catch the trolley mid journey. Even though the there is barely a story-line the film works. IT gets a tad slow here and there but Margret O'Brien steels every scene she is in. Judy Garland however is always a delight to watch. If you like her in this then make sure to see "In the Good Old Summertime". This film was beautifully filmed. If you can watch it on a Blu-ray.

Really? This is what I was waiting for? This film is just a bunch of clichés strung together with some macabre elements. I thought it would be a postcard to St. Louis, but it could have taken place anywhere. The World's Fair was barely relevant. The men were all stereotypes; the lordly-yet-foolish money-focused father who is changed by his family's warmth. The awkwardly formal men, the candied turn-of-the-century nostalgia. Other than Judy Garland's desire to extract a kiss out of her neighbor, the whole film is a silly tribute to normative culture. I guess that's what they hoped the boys fighting in Europe and Asia in 1944 wanted to see. This whole Ivy League worship was nauseating. "I'm talking to a Yale man in New York!" "Princeton is a peach of a school!" ...and the safe "Smith"-like names. The father wanting to move to NY for "money" even though they look pretty damn well off. The oldest sister's beau bursting into their house angrily and demanding that she marry him and he won't take no for an answer or whatever. Then walking out. A masturbatory fantasy for one-dimensional women. The only interesting point was the little sister's mischievousness. It was dark and playful part of an otherwise pointless costume drama.

This is a very, very boring film. But it might be enjoyable to those who like musicals (I just wonder why). The songs are silly, banal and not particular inspired. I don't stand the whole fuss about Judy Garland. She wasn't pretty and didn't have a great voice. The only reason why, for some people, she might look pretty is all the sof-focus close-ups she gets (and we know who was behind the camera) and also the unprettiness of the rest of the female cast. Not just the songs and music are uninspiring but also the plotine, and the characters are mere stereotypes . The camerawork is rather dull (especially in the scene where Garland and O'Brien sing & dance together). Anything positive about the film? Well just a few points. Margaret O'Brien steals the show in the mention dance sequence with Garland. Just look at where the rest of the cast pose their eyes on. She's also got the best lines: how she buries dead dolls in the cemetery and has to dig them up to take them to New York. Her song I was drunk, is probably the best as is a flow of fresh air among such a sugary and revolting collection of songs, and coming from a little girl like that is such hilarious. It breaks, with her constant interest in necrophilia, the strenuous idyllic, romantic and nostalgic view of an American city at the beginning of the century. It hints to a darker side of America to come (highlighted in the scene where she destroys the snowmen and also when she "kills" Mr. Braukoff by throwing flour at him). Another hilarous moment is when Garland and Lucille Bremmer are getting ready for the ball by tightening up their corsets. The sounds that Garlan emits as her sister is tightening her corset up from behind suggest to some kind of lesbian sexual intercourse (I'm just been sardonic here). Especially funny is their conversation on being able to handle 20 men between both of them. Garland actually says if her sister can handle at least 8 she could handle the rest... just hilarious. So hints of necrophilia, nymphomania and lesbianism in a very overrated film that are superb as they contrasted radically with the main themes of the film: Family unity, nostalgia for a bygone era, falling in love, marrying, etc.

This is one of my favorite movies with Judy Garland in it (the others being 'A Star Is Born' and 'Easter Parade'). She is so superb in it! Vincente Minnelli's direction is pristine and lushly beautiful. The supporting cast of the film also adds flair to the film. Little Margaret O'Brien plays Tootie, Judy's little sister in the film, who is a real standout. Lucille Bremer (a former Radio City Music Hall Rockette, who had a very short career at MGM), plays Judy's older sister who tries flirting with a colonel. The fabulous plot is very simple: The year is 1903, the town, St. Louis.Tthe Smith family is anxiously awaiting to go to the World's Fair in their hometown. Esther (Judy Garland) has an endless crush on the boy next door Jon Truett (Tom Drake. Then, Mr. Smith (Leon Ames) breaks the news to the family that they are moving to New York City so he can get a job. Mrs. Smith (Mary Astor), Tootie (Margaret O'Brien), Agnes (Joan Caroll), and Esther (Judy), are extremely disappointed. But, on Christmas Eve, they decide not to move after all, and become one of the first visitors to the St. Louis World's Fair of 1904. This movie is one of the greatest movie musicals of all time, and one of Judy Garland's BEST movies! (She sings the legendary "The Trolley Song", the heartwarming "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas", the lovely "The Boy Next Door", and the cute duet with Margaret O'Brien, "Under The Bamboo Tree") I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS WHOEVER LIKES MUSICALS! 10/10

Gag me. This is everything I hate in a musical. A family in the suburbs of St. Louis are living their life happily while their two eldest daughters, Rose and Esther, contemplate love and marriage. The beginning sets off the tone nicely: "How is this ketchup?" "Oh well it's too sweet..." "What do you think?" "Oh, much too flat." Indeed, the movie was nice enough to use its own device to describe what's wrong with it: sickly sweetness and flat tones. I haven't a problem with Technicolor or sweetness, but these people look like they're made out of marshmallow peeps and St. Louis looks like Candyland. Even the muddy street looks edible! Even when worries come up, there's never really any conflict, just a bunch of stretches to try to find a good way of fitting another song in; basic musical conceit, keep setting up songs and it's fun for the whole family. Now the singing is absolutely excellent, I'll give it that, but the music isn't particularly remarkable and the lyrics are terrible. However, it's all in the name of good family entertainment. Honestly, if it wasn't for the singing and the relatively compelling character of Tootie, who despite her cutesy name and her cutesy image is something of a fledgling sadist, it'd be hard to really care about the plot... wait a minute, plot? You mean the thing where these characters fall in love, then fear a move, then don't move, then just go back to being in love? Oops, looks like we forgot something. Something else is a bit confusing about this movie... it's set in 1903... so why does nothing about it feel like 1903, at all? It's so incredibly anachronistic it's appalling. But see, we're not supposed to focus on any of these things, we're only supposed to feel happy and lovely that everything works out in the end, or something. It's dated escapism; very little of it seems really appealing or even important theseadays. I'm sure if you're looking for a way to "fall in love all over again" or something, this could be a good movie to cozy down to, but then again, there's a lot better out there for just that same purpose. --PolarisDiB

If there was no other reason why Judy Garland married Vincente Minnelli, then this film supplies the reason for how he won her hand. It's a valentine to her talents and, as an example of MGM's gilt-edged manufacture, it's a sold gold entry. Yes, Tom Drake was a bit wan as Judy's love interest but everyone else in the cast, maybe even including the too-glamorous Lucille Bremer, are just right, especially the inimitable Marjorie Main. Mary Astor, already deep in the throes of her extended bout with alcoholism as the family's matriarch shows nary a sign of her illness, such was the wizardry of the makeup artists, costumers, hair dressers and the cinematographer. And Judy, too, already addicted to the medications that her tyrannical studio bosses used to keep her nose to a very demanding grindstone, looks as wholesome and lovely as one could wish, particularly in the "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" number. It's one of those Golden Age classics that always repays a return viewing and its naysayers are in a rather lonely minority, in my opinion.

This movie is sheer delight from start to finish. I'm sure St. Louis in 1904 wasn't really the same as its depicted here...but it should have been! Only the most jaded cynic imaginable could not be charmed by this film. The songs are perfect, the cinematography, the set direction, costumes, everything really - MGM movie magic at its best! Vincente Minelli did a superlative job of direction, and the cast simply could not be bettered. Judy Garland gives what I feel is the most relaxed and charming performance of her career, and sings like an angel, not like the jittery bundle of nerves she would become in later life. Tom Drake is very winning as the "Boy Next Door" we should all be so lucky to have. But Margaret O'Brien absolutely steals the picture as the adorable but irrepressibly morbid Tootie, a refreshing change from the normally saccharine moppets of Hollywood's golden years. Marjorie Main also swipes a scene or two as the mouthy cook, and Mary Astor and Leon Ames give sterling support as the parents. Their "make-up" scene at the piano is beautifully done. What a wonderful antidote this movie is when you need to retreat from the harsh world and have your spirits lifted for a while.

In the year before the 1904 St Louis World's Fair, the four Smith daughters learn lessons of life and love, even as they prepare for a reluctant move to New York. This film took me a while to warm up to. Judy Garland, the star of the film, is dressed horribly with awful hair, and frankly I find her singing voice quite atrocious. How can this be? In others films ("Wizard of Oz" and "A Star in Born") she sings so nicely. Of course, the songs in general are pretty awful in this one... not fun like other musicals (e.g. "State Fair"). I would have rated the film lower, but the Halloween scene redeemed it. Kids starting fires, dumping in old furniture, and smashing people in the face with flour? Priceless.