The Great Ziegfeld (1936)

Academy Awards, USA 1937

Winner Oscar	Best Picture
	Best Actress in a Leading Role Luise Rainer
	Best Dance Direction Seymour Felix For "A Pretty Girl Is Like a Melody".
Nominee Oscar	Best Director Robert Z. Leonard
	Best Writing, Original Story William Anthony McGuire
	Best Art Direction Cedric Gibbons Eddie Imazu Edwin B. Willis
	Best Film Editing William S. Gray

MGM
Directed by Robert Z. Leonard
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(DVD, Warner Bros.)

William Powell plays the famous entrepreneur and Broadway producer Florenz Ziegfeld. The story traces his origins from a sideshow at the Chicago World's fair where he successfully lures customers away from competitor Frank Morgan. On a trip to Europe, he steals Morgan's new discovery by lying about his wealth. He does however eventually make her a star. Later he comes up with the idea to reproduce the French follies around handpicked American beauties. The lavish productions, which are reproduced here in vivid detail, are a hit. However, when their popularity eventually declines he has as string of misses while his personal life falls apart. He makes a strong comeback on Broadway, but loses everything in the stock market crash of 1929. He never really recovers, and dies a broken man, in the particularly bad, cliched final scene. Overlong by at least an hour, this is a real chore to sit through, with a standard biopic plot, mugging by Fannie Brice and overacting by Luise Rainer.