RED HOT AND BLUE

US, 1989, 84 minutes, Black and white.
Betty Hutton, Victor Mature, June Havoc, William Demarest.
Directed by John Farrow.

Red Hot and Blue is a Betty Hutton musical comedy. It is mainly for those who like the rather raucous comedienne. She starred at Paramount in a number of films in the late 1940s with a rather clown style, noisy, brash. This is one of those films. She made more impact with Fred Astaire in Let's Dance and in M.G.M's George Sidney production of Annie Get Your Gun. She was also in The Greatest Show on Earth and Somebody Loves Me with Ralph Meeker. This is a very brief gangster comedy: a young girl comes to New York, hoping to get on the stage, is romantically involved with a serious director (played in a rather subdued manner by Victor Mature) and boards with girlfriends, including June Havoc. By mistake she is witness to a murder and is pursued by gangsters, including composer (Guys and Dolls, Most Happy Fella) Frank Loesser who composed the songs for this film, including a comic version of Hamlet. Needless to say, everything works out in the end. The film is of interest as indicating the comic styles of these gangster musicals of the time, for the work of Betty Hutton, Victor Mature and William Demarest. Direction is by John Farrow who made so many action adventures with Alan Ladd in the '40s and a number of bigger budgeted features in the '50s.