Cabaret (1972)

Starring: Liza Minnelli, Michael York, Helmut Griem, Joel Grey, Fritz Wepper, Marisa Berenson
Director: Bob Fosse
Writer:    Jay Allen
Studio:    Allied Artists
Rated:     PG
Runtime: 2h 04m
Year:       1972

            Bob Fosse's 1972 film adaptation of the John Kander / Fred Ebb musical Cabaret is often referred to as the last great movie musical.  While I can't quite agree with that sentiment (people seem to be forgetting That Thing You Do!), I will agree that it is a very entertaining, and oftentimes thought-provoking, film.

            What surprised me about Fosse's film version is that it is a totally different plot than the Broadway version.  There are only two characters who remains in the story:  the cabaret star Sally Bowles, and the Master of Ceremonies.  The ever-present Sally Bowles, in the play a British expatriate, in the movie becomes an American cabaret star / wannabe film actress (played by Liza Minnelli).  Her love interest, instead of being an American traveller who falls hopelessly in love with Sally, is a British writer named Brian Roberts (Michael York), who seems to have no preference either way about loving men or women.  The play's subplot of an interracial romance between the middle-aged couple Fraulein Schneider (Sally's landlady) and Herr Schultz remains an affair between an Aryan and a Jew; the characters are just youthened 30 years, becoming friends of Sally and Brian, and given name changes, the man becoming Fritz Wendel (Fritz Wepper) and the woman Natalia Landauer (Marisa Berenson).  As well, a sixth main character is added, one Maximilian von Heune (Helmut Griem), who becomes a friend, confidant, and lover of both Sally and Brian.

            The movie succeeds in many ways.  It brings forward the heinous decadence and debauchery of Weimar Berlin, right before the National Socialists came to power.  Instead of pouncing all over the sacreligious goings-on, however, it contrasts it as a period of fun compared to the oncoming Nazi regime.  By using a cross-cutting editing montage between the stage routines and real-life drama, Fosse provides a running a commentary on events.  For instance, a running series of scenes portraying the owner of the Kit Kat Klub's battle with the Nazis are complemented by song and dance numbers that strengthen the director's position and take on the situation.

            The songs are, of course, classic.  Joel Grey, the Master of Ceremonies, is the erstwhile narrator, and while not as sleazy as the Alan Cumming character in the Broadway version of the show (which I was fortunate enough to see while he was still starring in it), he guides us through the events.  As Fritz and Natalia fall in love, we are witness to a song called "If You Could See Her," in which the MC dances with a gorilla -- with the last line of the song being, "if you could see her through my eyes, she wouldn't look Jewish at all."  It seems even the MC has fallen victim to Nazi ideology.

            By far the strongest, and most chilling, event in the movie is a scene set in a biergarten, where a cherubic, angel-faced young boy of about 14 or 15 stands up and sings a song in a sweet falsetto voice, called "Tomorrow Belongs To Me."  As the first verse ends, the camera pans down to fix upon the boy's uniform -- a Hitler Youth uniform with the Swastika prominent on the armband.  The occupants of the biergarten stand up, at first one by one, but finally in increasingly larger numbers, as the camera intercuts between close-ups of possessed faces (including those of little girls) singing and the company standing at attention with their arms raised in the Nazi salute, as the once-sweet lullaby changes its beat into that of a military march.  If you don't get shivers up and down your spine while watching this scene, you must be a member of the Aryan Brotherhood.

            That's not to say that this is a perfect musical by any means.  One of the main problems happens to be the star of the piece, Liza Minnelli.  Sure, she won an Oscar for her performance, and in the scenes between her and Brian, when she's just acting, she acquits herself extremely well.  But the scenes in the cabaret are a different matter.  Sally Bowles is supposed to be a third-rate talent -- hence her not being able to get out of the nightclub.  Jennifer Jason Leigh, when I saw her in the role on Broadway this past February, could carry the tune effectively, but her voice was a trifle flat, which was perfect for the character.  But Minnelli has lungs of steel, and belts out every song perfectly, which kind of defeats the fact that she's struggling and trying to make something of herself.  You keep wondering why she doesn't just move up the ladder.  It can't be due to a lack of talent, that's for sure. The only other things that got on my nerves was the unnecessary subplot about Sally's aborted pregnancy, and the fact that the film was so obviously made in the 1970s hippie era (its attitudes, its clothing and props).

            But if you're in the mood for seeing a movie musical that's not all light and fluffy like those wonderful Astaire-Rogers musicals of the 1930s, there's none better to choose than Fosse's Cabaret.  With good performances, and especially perfectly marvellous songs, how can you really go wrong?

**** stars.