The Broadway Melody

The Broadway Melody's historical status -- the first sound movie to win Best Picture, and one of the earliest examples of the musical genre -- can't be denied, but neither can its total irrelevance to a modern audience. The Broadway Melody isn't just a product of its time, it is a movie frozen in amber, a relic of another civilization, which makes it a very hard sell to all but the most psychotic movie buffs. The film was made and released the same year as the pioneering Jazz Singer, and it shows the early growing pains of sound movies. Stage shows, with a variety of acts and performers, were still the rage in 1929, and The Broadway Melody is designed from front to back to capture that experience. I have complained in other reviews about musicals with performances that have little bearing on the story ("Cell Block Tango" from Chicago is one of my most hated offenders of this), but even those at least featured members of the cast. On a couple of occasions, The Broadway Melody's gossamer-thin story is brought to a paralytic halt to allow song and dance numbers that feature people who are otherwise not involved in the movie whatsoever. This is contextualized within the movie as being acts produced in the same revue as the main characters, but they serve no purpose other than to capture the feeling of a Broadway revue show on film for people in 1929 because the technology would allow it. In 2026 (or whenever you read this), it's just filler, nothing more. Filler performances in a musical aren't uncommon, but The Broadway Melody barely has sufficient structure to support its plot, which is so slight and trifling, it's almost grammatically incorrect to call it a plot. Two sisters show up in New York with hopes of making it big on Broadway. They both fall in love with the same guy. For no defined reason, the guy dates the sister he doesn't really love, while the one he does love dates a sugar daddy. That's it. It may seem like enough grist for the mill, but I can assure you that the way it is executed, to call it the bare minimum would be overselling it. Now add into this mixture acting that is, to say the least, dodgy, and songs that will leave your head before they're over, and you have a movie that has nothing to offer anybody. All of The Broadway Melody's crimes can be traced back to one thing out of its control: when it was made, and the circumstances around when it was made. The movies that won Best Picture before and after The Broadway Melody (Wings and All Quiet On The Western Front) are good movies that don't feel inaccessible because of their age. The Broadway Melody cannot escape the when and why of its production, and because of it, the only reason to watch it in the 21st century is for Best Picture winner completionist runs. Outside of that, it's aged itself out of relevance.