DVD Review: Deanna Durbin Collection

Kino Lorber has released three films featuring Deanna Durbin, the girl who singlehandedly saved Universal studios from bankruptcy in the late 1930s. Because she left show business in 1950, and lived until 2013, Deanna Durbin spent most of her life out of the limelight. When Durbin left movies she said she wanted to just be "a nobody," moved to France with her husband and granted one interview (in 1983 for David Shipman). Richard Lamparski indicated that when he was doing his Whatever Became Of...? book series in the 1960s and 1970s that Durbin was the celebrity most asked about by his readers.

Kino Lorber's 3-disc set features beautiful restorations of Durbin's Universal features "100 Men and a Girl," "Three Smart Girls Grow Up," and "It Started With Eve." Each film allows her to exhibit her acting ability, flare for comedy, and operatic singing voice.

100 MEN AND A GIRL (1937)

Deanna Durbin's second film, made after her huge hit "Three Smart Girls" (1936), which is the movie that kept Universal studios afloat. This one features her as an energetic young girl whose musician father (Adolphe Menjou) has trouble finding work. She puts together an orchestra featuring him and all of his unemployed musician cronies, and talks the great Leopold Stokowski into conducting them. This film was effective in presenting Durbin's manner and her operatic singing voice most effectively and, like "Three Smart Girls," was a huge hit for the studio. Critics at the time noted how Durbin could sing and act effectively. It is fun to see Alice Brady and Eugene Pallette play a married couple just as they had in the Universal studios classic "My Man Godfrey" (1936). Mischa Auer, from that film, also appears here and is again a bombastic creative type. Billy Gilbert, Jed Prouty, Christian Rub, Jed Prouty, and Alma Kruger round out the fun cast of familiar faces. Henry Koster directed, just as he had helmed "Three Smart Girls." Some consider this to be the best of all of Deanna Durbin's movies.

THREE SMART GIRLS GROW UP (1939)

Decidedly tardy sequel to Deanna Durbin's first big success, this movie brings back nearly all of the principle players from the original (Helen Parrish replaces Barbara Read as one of the title sisters). Bob Cummings secured a contract with Universal based on his amusingly foppish appearance in this one. The conflict deals with one sister falling for another one's beau, and Deanna, the youngest acting as matchmaker. Charles Winninger as the girls' father is delightfully befuddled, and Nella Walker, as his wife, is the anchor. Again, Durbin is given ample opportunity to sing as is in fine voice throughout. Henry Koster once again directs.

IT STARTED WITH EVE (1941)

Another one of Deanna Durbin's best films, this is a romantic comedy in which Bob Cummings tells his dying father (Charles Laughton) that he is engaged to be married. But when his father rallies, he must hastily find someone to pretend to be his intended. He finds Deanna on the street, needing money, and arranges for her to play the role. It's all quite fast paced and delightful in the screwball comedy tradition, with a cast filled with funny people like Guy Kibbee, Walter Catlett, Irving Bacon and Gus Schilling. Durbin and Cummings play opposite each other very effectively and, yes, Henry Koster is the director. But it was the last Durbin film he directed.

Not long after "It Started With Eve," Durbin sought more serious dramatic roles, and she was quite good in "Lady on a Train" (1945). But these movies were not as strong at the box office, her fans preferring the light, fun musicals she had been making. By the end of the 1940s, Durbin was tired of acting and singing and longed for the life of "a nobody." She left films and lived quietly and happily in France until her death at age 91.

Kino Lorber's set of Deanna Durbin films are great examples of what was popular with moviegoers in the late 1930s and early 1940s. Durbin's appeal transcends all time and generations. This blu ray set is highly recommended.

It can be ordered at this link: Deanna Durbin Movies.