The Music Man [VHS]

The Music Man [VHS]
by Morton DaCosta, Scott Benson

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Product details

Actor: Buddy Hackett, Onna White, Robert Preston, Shirley Jones, Susan Luckey
Director: Morton DaCosta, Scott Benson
Producer: Morton DaCosta
Producer: Joel Freeman
Writer: Franklin Lacey
Writer: Marion Hargrove
Writer: Meredith Willson
Writer: Tom Edwards
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Original Language), Analog
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, NTSC, Original recording reissued, Special Edition
Running Time: 177 minutes
Release Date: 2000-09-19
Audience Rating: G (General Audience)
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Studio: Warner Home Video

VHS Movie Reviews of The Music Man [VHS]

Movie Review: Not my favorite musical
Summary: 3 Stars

It's possible I'm operating from a subconscious prejudice with regard to this movie (my parents went to see the original Broadway version and walked out before the end of the first act), but I really couldn't bring myself to enjoy it as much as I probably should have. Playwright/composer Meredith Willson (who grew up in Mason City, IA, in the first two decades of the 20th Century, and played with John Philip Sousa's band) was clearly writing what he knew, and with more than 40 songs--twice or more what most musicals boast--plus several lively dance numbers, it may be the finest of the late MGM examples. In the year 1912, a man (Robert Preston) who calls himself Prof. Harold Hill ("bandleaders are always called 'Professor'") comes to River City, IA, and soon persuades the citizens that the presence of a new pool table in their town (quite different, he insists, from a billiard table) is the first step on a slippery slope that will ruin their "innocent" sons and daughters, leading to "horse race gambling" and dancing to "shameless" ragtime music. His solution? "River City needs a boys' band"--for which he is conveniently prepared to order instruments, uniforms, and manuals. What the audience knows and the Iowans don't is that Hill (not his real name) is a con artist who can't read a note (although, to be fair, the instruments and uniforms do arrive as advertised). His chief opposition is town librarian Marian Paroo (Shirley Jones), who thinks he's a "masher" or worse, so of course he has to try to romance and distract her. But as he waits for the band equipment to arrive, he finds himself growing genuinely attached to her, her little brother Winthrop (Ronny Howard), and the town itself. He even does his bit to improve the place: by persuading the members of the School Board (the Buffalo Bills), who've been feuding for 20 years, to sing together in barbershop-quartet fashion, he defuses their rivalries; he engineers what may be the reformation of the local "wild kid," Tommy Djilas (Timmy Everett), and furthers his courtship of Zaneeta Shinn (Susan Luckey), daughter of the mayor (Paul Ford), who happens to own the pool table and so distrusts Hill, and his wife (Hermione Gingold), whom Hill recruits to the band's "dance committee."

Of course the high point of the film is Preston recreating his original stage role; at 44 he still had a lot of zip, and his flamboyant style perfectly suits the con-artist character he plays. Jones's soaring soprano is another plus, and it's intriguing to see how, even with Queen Victoria 11 years in her grave, the small towns of America still lived heavily by Victorian codes, with an almost paranoid concentration on appearances and respectability. The costumes are wonderful and the library set particularly is charming. And yet somehow I just don't seem to like this movie as much as I do Seven Brides for Seven Brothers or Meet Me In St. Louis (Two-Disc Special Edition). Maybe it just seems to be trying too hard (having been made well after either of them, in a day when, as Jones points out in her introduction, the studios just "weren't making the big flashy musicals any more" and perhaps had forgotten how to do it right).

Movie Review: The Music Man
Summary: 5 Stars

Thoroughly enjoyable DVD, with excellent color and excellent quality. I love the music in this musical. Robert Preston does an incredible job as the con man who comes to town to start a boy's band. The "76 Trombones" number is lots of fun. And it's fun to see Ron Howard as a little boy. Great musical.

Movie Review: Music Man
Summary: 5 Stars

When this movie first came out I went to see it with one of my daughters. She has since passed awaay so it brings back so many plesant memories. I also love the music and the characters. It is a wonderful movie for people of all ages wish they made more loke them.

Movie Review: The tune is stuck in my head
Summary: 5 Stars

Took longer than i thought it would to get here but well worth it. They dont Make e'm this good any more. If you dont have it, get it! if you're like me you allready had it on VHS but wanted it on DVD for even better Sound.

Movie Review: Music-filled story of a simpler time
Summary: 4 Stars

This movie of Meredith Wilson's "The Music Man" is quite a treat for the eyes and ears.
This bargain-priced edition offers some extra features - the soundtrack has been remastered; there's a short documentary on the making of the movie; an intro by Shirley Jones, who plays the female lead; and a couple of theatrical trailers.
This is plenty for me. I find the so-called "audio commentaries" (where someone is yaking while the movie is running) to be an annoyance. And I've never understood why DVDs sometimes include a radio version of the movie. I've got the movie, for heaven's sake!
Anyway, if you're a curmudgeon like me and buy movie DVDs for the movie, take advantage of Amazon's great price on this one. You won't be sorry.

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Summary of The Music Man [VHS]

The Music Man was one of the last great movie musicals from any studio, and it proved to be that rarest of events: a Broadway show that was measurably improved by its transition to the screen. Robert Preston made his musical debut--both live and on film--as "Professor" Harold Hill, the upbeat charlatan who promises to teach a small-town boys band by the "think system." But it's the part Preston was born to play and the one for which he will always be best remembered. Composer Meredith Willson based The Music Man on his own small-town Midwestern boyhood, circa 1912, a quasi-mythical place where the old-maid librarian looks and sings like Shirley Jones. The boy himself is an adorable Ron Howard, lisp-singing "Gary, Indiana." Willson's entire score, featuring a combination of what are now standards, such as "Goodnight My Someone" and "Till There Was You" and show-specific numbers ("Trouble," "76 Trombones"), is never less than infectious. This dazzling special edition is also as bright and sunny as any 4th of July in Iowa could ever hope to be. --Robert Windeler

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