Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Keira Brennan The movie is made so realistic it has a lot of that WoW feeling at the right moments and never tooo over the top. the suspense is done so well and the emotion is felt. Very well put together with the music and all.

Lela The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Darin One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

john-4950 I saw this film in 1959 on late night Television at age 14. It left a very favorable and lasting impression with me. I only discovered today day via the Internet, the actual title was "BROADWAY GONDOLIER". I can remember seeing Dick Powell as a gondolier, singing pleasant music and what did I know of the movies at the age of 14 years? Virtually zero at that age! I remember my laughing a lot through this film, if you folks reading this posting have recently seen this very enjoyable Musical Comedy entertainment count yourselves very lucky indeed. As far as I am concerned, I indeed envy your good fortune. It is currently Un-Available on DVD, I suspect it has never been released to Home-Video. We are lucky that the Warner Brothers made such a generally enjoyable entertainment for us at the time of the "Mid-Point of the Great Depression" in 1935. I am sure audiences were wanting to escape their financial woes during the time of this film's release, and that Movie Stars in general would have been living the "High-Life" in comparison to the average person in the street. Irrespective whether Dick Powell was pleading for stronger movie roles, only passing time and film Historians have revealed these facts to us... I have been wanting to get a copy of this film, and I am hoping the Warner Archive will release it on DVD before much longer. I disagree with all the "Negative" reviews posted here on IMDb about this film and many other films. Going to the Movies is like taking a ride in a car, you either want to be on the journey or you do not. A lot of present day audiences are prejudiced against seeing "Black-and-White" movies and many have told me so. Dear reader, if you get the opportunity to view this Black-and-White Film, you need to realize one finer point of movie production in the 1930's and through to the 1950's... And that is that Black-and-White films were made on Nitrate Film Stock using Fine-Grain Silver-Salts to produce real intense Blacks and many Shades of Grey through to Zero-Silver-Salts giving Dazzling White Light from the Carbon-Arc Projector-Lamp-Houses on the Cinema Screens of that time. And unless you are seeing an original 35mm Black-and-White "Original" Nitrate Print struck from the original Camera Negative being projected from a Carbon-Arc Lamp-House, you will usually be seeing the Movie from an Old-16mm-Print (from a Television Station ) using Low-Contrast copies, and you are not seeing the film that audiences were viewing at the time of the Original Release, even during the Great Depression. Later in my life, I was employed as Cinema Projectionist ( for over 30 years ) and I recall my mentor revealing to me that in his youth, he was employed as a junior to soak the Nitrate 35mm Movie prints in a bath tub, and his job was to recover the SILVER-SALTS from the Film-Stock, and the Film Exchanges recovered the actual SILVER from the prints, bringing in a great deal of money as a consequence. This was revealed to me by a Chief Projectionist who had worked in Cinemas and Overseas in the Armed Services as Projectionist during World War 2. Dear reader, I hope you are now, a little better informed, that you are not seeing "Black-and-White" films these days ( in the year 2017 ) as they were Originally presented to audiences during the Golden Years of Cinema in the 1930's and the 1940's, but you are seeing a mere facsimile of what was Originally presented during those Golden years. And back then, and in my time in Cinemas, we took care and were proud of the way we presented each and every motion picture to the Cinema-going public, I am proud to claim to you dear reader I was a "Show-Man"...Please to all fellow reviewers, please no more nasty comments... and to you dear reader, Thank You...

MartinHafer Dick Powell was immensely popular in films during the 1930s. Warner Brothers shoved him into picture after picture...yet Powell was not happy. He longed to have meatier roles and was tired of playing boy next door types in musicals. After seeing "Broadway Gondolier", I could see why he hated these sorts of roles. And, like many of his musicals of the day, they haven't aged all that well.The biggest problem with "Broadway Gondolier" is that the plot is pure puff--with no depth and a story that just doesn't make sense. Powell plays Dick Purcell*, a cab driver who longs to sing on the radio. However, after blowing his audition to sing for a show sponsored by a cheese company, he gets another chance by pretending to be someone else...and Italian gondolier! Sounds ridiculous? Absolutely. Powell sounds about as Italian as Mantan Moreland or Anna May Wong! The plot makes absolutely no sense and the film is filled with a lot of not particularly memorable songs. Not a terrible film but not a good one.*It is very interesting that they chose the name 'Dick Purcell' for Mr. Powell. That's because there already WAS an actor with the REAL name of Dick Purcell in Hollywood. He would soon make a niche for himself in Hollywood playing, among other things, Captain America.

Neil Doyle DICK POWELL is a cab driver with singing aspirations who doesn't mind holding up traffic while he demonstrates his singing prowess to a couple of captive passengers who are so impressed they arrange an audition for him. Only in the movies, only in the movies.This is another one of those improbable Warner Bros. comedies with a far-fetched plot that has him spoiling his radio audition when his song turns out to be a children's ditty with his part relegated to imitating barnyard animals. With the mike still on, he loses his temper and the job.When JOAN BLONDELL, as assistant to radio manager GRANT MITCHELL, is assigned to Italy, who should follow her (as a stowaway aboard ship), but Powell, still intent on impressing her with his singing. Before you know it, thanks to his pal ADOLPHE MENJOU, Powell gets work as a gondolier. After that, the plot follows the rather familiar course of boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl, all in musical comedy fashion of the '30s.Dick Powell has a pleasant, if unremarkable voice and his tenor serenading is pleasing enough, as is his flair with light material. Of course, he bowls over the radio station's sponsor (LOUISE FAZENDA) the moment he lifts his voice in song within earshot of those he needs to impress as he rows his gondolier in the moonlight.Naturally, Blondell re-discovers him in a new setting and romance blossoms. It's the kind of set-up Warners would use later for their female star, DORIS DAY, always being discovered for either a radio show or Hollywood by Jack Carson or Dennis Morgan in her early Warner comedies that used the same formula.It's pleasant nonsense, easy to take, and makes no special demands on your viewing pleasure if you enjoy watching DICK POWELL and JOAN BLONDELL so obviously enjoying themselves. None of the songs are particularly memorable and it's the kind of film soon forgotten after one viewing, but obviously it offered the kind of entertainment that answered the needs of undemanding Depression-era audiences.

David (Handlinghandel) This little known Dick Powell-Joan Blondell romance musical, with a good turn by Louise Fazenda, is a charmer. What I like most is its erudition. Those must have been the days. At the beginning, occasionally in the middle, and near the end, everyone on the street seems to know the turns and lyrics to arias from Rigoletto.""What's THAT?!" most movie audiences would ask today.It opens with two music critics debating how one aria goes, then their cab driver -- who turns into the title character when he masquerades, per his vocal coach Adolph Menjou, as an Italian to get on the radio here -- joins in and a beat cop also does.The rest of the music is very nice, too; but not quite Verdi.