UnowPriceless hyped garbage

BroadcastChic Excellent, a Must See

ShangLuda Admirable film.

Marva-nova Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

utgard14 Musical remake of the classic The Shop Around the Corner. The story, about two bickering co-workers (Van Johnson, Judy Garland) who fall in love through anonymous letters to one another, is transplanted to turn of the century America. It also has a much lighter tone, more suited for a musical I suppose but also loses some of what made the original such a great film. Nice cast full of likable actors. The songs are okay. It's enjoyable enough but there just seems to be something missing. Maybe if I had seen this one before the 1940 film I would have preferred this. Doubtful, but maybe. Liza Minnelli makes her screen debut at age 3 in the final shot of the movie.

kenjha Musical remake of "The Shop Around the Corner" is pleasing enough but is no match for the Ernst Lubitch masterpiece starring James Stewart and Maragret Sullavan. Garland is spunky as a woman who dreams of being swept off her feet by her pen pal. Johnson, in the role played by Stewart in the original, does OK as Garland's co-worker in a music shop. Sakall, billed with nickname "Cuddles," is definitely cuddly as the owner of the shop. Keaton's comedic talents are wasted. The subplot involving the Stradivarius and aspiring violinist Van Dyke, which was not in the original, wears thin. The musical numbers are nothing to write home about.

bkoganbing Given how Judy Garland scored so well in another period piece, Meet Me In St. Louis, it was a natural that she be cast in In The Good Old Summertime even if she was a replacement for June Allyson. It's called serendipity. The film is a musical adaption of MGM's The Shop Around The Corner in which James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan played the anonymous correspondents who love what each other write, but can't stand each other in person. It doesn't help that the two of them are co-workers in a department store.Van Johnson takes the Stewart part in In The Good Old Summertime and early 20th century Budapest is transferred to early 20th century Chicago. Johnson and Garland work in a music store with Spring Byington, Clinton Sundberg, and Buster Keaton and that's owned by S.Z. Sakall. Sakall is far more lovable as he always is than Frank Morgan in the same part in The Shop Around The Corner. A bit thick, but lovable. He does think he has talent on the violin, the same way Jack Benny did on his radio program. He plays it as well as Benny did and even playing it on a Stradivarius doesn't help.Except for one new song, Merry Christmas, the rest of the score is interpolated period favorites like Meet Me Tonight In Dreamland, I Never Knew, I Don't Care and of course the title song. Judy is really in her element doing these numbers. In fact two of the early century's great musical performers, Blanche Ring who introduced In The Good Old Summertime, and Eva Tanguay whose specialty song was I Don't Care, were still alive to see Judy do both of their numbers for the current audience. I've often wondered what they must have thought.Buster Keaton is strangely subdued in this film. He only gets one real comic moment doing a pratfall on a dance floor and breaking a violin in the process. I'm betting some of his material wound up on the cutting room floor.At the very end of the film, little Liza Minnelli all of three at the time made her screen debut. If you like period pieces as I do and the music of the era as I do or if you liked The Shop Around The Corner or the most current adaption of the piece, You've Got Mail with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, than you will appreciate and enjoy In The Good Old Summertime.If you do like it, that's a very good sign.

moonspinner55 Musical remake of "The Shop Around the Corner" from 1940 concerns a bachelor (Van Johnson) in 1930s Chicago who shares an intriguing pen-pal relationship with a single gal (Judy Garland), unaware his mystery lady is actually the brash co-worker whom he hates. MGM product with decidedly less gloss and panache than usual. The leads do all right, supporting cast (including S.Z. 'Cuddles' Sakall and Buster Keaton, who reportedly directed some scenes) is very good, but the songs are middling and the story seems to take forever to wind up. Liza Minnelli makes her screen debut here...as the dark-eyed, ruby-lipped toddler in the final scene. Material was later transformed into a Broadway musical entitled "She Loves Me", and was the basis yet again for 1998's "You've Got Mail". ** from ****