Excellent adaptation.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Gene Kelly was one of the most talented and charismatic performers in classic musicals, some of his dance routines being among cinema's most jaw-dropping. And George Cukor was a fine director with a filmography that contained a number of favourites.Both have done better films than 'Les Girls', in fact everybody involved pretty much has, but the film is definitely well worth watching and is entertaining in its own right. To me, what came off least successfully is the story, which is basically a musical version of Akira Kurosawa's 'Rashomon' (except that film handled its story structure much better). It is certainly intriguing, and it is difficult to resist its often risqué and disarming nature, but it does struggle at times to sustain momentum and material for a running time that feels over-stretched, making the latter half pedestrian narratively. And while interesting the flashback structure doesn't always feel as smooth as it could have been, some of it clumsy and disorganised.Cole Porter's songs have been criticised for reasons that are understandable. None of the songs are bad, Porter was too good a composer/song-writer to write bad music, and are reasonably pleasant, but this is not one of Porter's better song scores. Pleasant enough, but nowhere near as memorable or as inspired, apart from some witty and naughty lyric-writing (though there are instances where they are over-shadowed by some distracting stage business in the choreography), as they could have been, disappointing for a great composer/song-writer who should have gone out on a high note but didn't. Jacques Bergerac is also insipidly dull in a role with practically nothing to it, basically the sort of role that's there for the sake of being a plot device but nothing more.Despite how this all sounds, 'Les Girls' does have a number of merits that it is difficult to be too hard on it. The best assets are the production values and the performances of the ladies. 'Les Girls' is simply a stunning-looking film, the colours are eye-poppingly ravishing, the sets are lavish, the costumes are beautifully chic and the cinematography often dazzles. The ladies manage to steal the show under those who most would naturally see the film for (Kelly, Cukor and Porter). Particularly note-worthy is the perfection that is Kay Kendall, who is charming and hilarious and would have had a bigger career if it hadn't been cut short so early and tragically. Mitzi Gaynor also has fun with her role and makes the character sympathetic too, while Taina Elg is suitably sultry.Kelly is always watchable, and dances with charisma and his usual polish and technical meticulousness in routines that, while not exactly career highlights, do show off how incredible a dancer he was, even if his character is one of his least endearing (though he does bring wit and charm). Cukor makes the most of the production values and there is enough elegance and lightness of touch, but it does seem in the early parts especially that he wasn't in complete control, or entirely trust or was comfortable, with the material. The script is wonderfully witty and also has a risqué boldness and sexiness.On the whole, not a great film, and doesn't see the enormously talented people in front of and behind the camera doing the best work of their careers, but absolutely worth watching for the production values and Kendall. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Cole Porter in the last original score he wrote showed that even with all of the tragic health problems he had suffered through, he could still write witty words and hummable music with this rather obscure MGM musical, the last Gene Kelly did for the studio. Playing once again an American in Paris (as well as the rest of Western Europe), he is a cabaret star involved in romantic scandal with the three "les girls" (no relation to the Australian drag queens of the same name from "Priscilla Queen of the Desert") he performs with in a lavish Moulin Rouge like cabaret show. The three girls are Mitzi Gaynor, Kay Kendall and Taina Elg, and they each have to tell their side of the story when one of the girls suddenly attempts suicide. "What is truth?" an observer outside the courtroom writes on a banner he carries. In this era of even worse obsession with public scandal of performers, this musical is very modern in its thinking, and thanks to a jet-perfect screenplay and the wonderful songs surrounding it, "Les Girls" is a gem worthy of being re-discovered, and even better in my opinion than Kelly's previous visit to Paris back in 1951.The songs vary, from spoofing "The Wild Bunch" ("Why am I So Gone About That Girl?") with Kelly in Brando gear, a wonderful art deco title song, and the extremely campy "Ladies in Waiting" with lyrics that are just as witty as Porter's songs for his series of hit musical comedies on Broadway of the 1920's, 30's and 40's (many of them set in Paris where he was the toast of the town). As heard on the original soundtrack album, "Ladies in Waiting" is a definite drag number, here performed by women in vintage Bourbon era costumes, and seen twice, one with one of the characters intoxicated and altering the lyrics in her boozy state.The acting honors go to Kay Kendall here, a delightful British actress whose career was cut short by leukemia. Her character seems oh so sophisticated and cool, but as the audience learns in the second part of this episodic story, her character has a major battle with the bottle. In her duet with Kelly, "You're Just Too Too!", she is delightfully lovable and eccentric, and her fun performance won her a Golden Globe (in a tie with her co-star, Taina Elg). Elg plays the most sensitive (and neurotic) of the three, and her solo, Ça c'est l'amour", is truly profound. Gaynor's chorus girl is the most undeveloped, although she gets to be the femme fatal in the "Wild Bunch" spoof which has a very colorful red based set, offshot by the black waitress outfit that Gaynor wears and Kelly's leather motorcycle jacket. Also prominent in the film are Jacques Bergerac as Elg's society born fiancée, Leslie Phillips as the British nobleman who entices Kendall with the possibility of a title and vinegar voiced Henry Daniell (a veteran of villain roles) as the sour faced judge. This is a spectacular musical to look at (as well as delightfully funny), and I am surprised that as well liked as reviewers here have made it that it isn't more well known. The story does slow down in the later moments, and like artistic flops "Yolanda and the Thief" and "The Pirate", it may seem pretentious to some. It should come as no surprise that its director was George Cukor, who would later have another more well known musical triumph with the film version of "My Fair Lady". For me, the important factor of this musical is the idea of "What is Truth?", the multiple conflicts of sensitive Elg, boozy Kendall and down to earth, realistic Gaynor when paired with the Pal Joey like egotistical Kelly who ends up with some health issues in the final sequence. The obsession with personal scandal today remains fresh, and perhaps it is a bit ahead of its time in its seemingly knowing of the future of court T.V. where fifteen minutes of fame becomes the obsession of so many non-public figures. With many MGM musicals having been adapted for the Broadway stage, this one seems one of the more deserving, perhaps because of the fact that it simply isn't as well known as the over-abundance of classics ("An American in Paris", "Meet Me in St. Louis", "Gigi") that have been done, often with mixed results.

Cole Porter's final film score and next to last music written for any media is Les Girls. The same team producer Sol Seigal and writer John Patrick who produced and wrote the adaption of The Philadelphi Story for High Society worked with Porter again and this time George Cukor was directing. It's a good film, but I've got the feeling that it could have been a whole lot better. One of the criticisms that Porter used to get annoyed with was the perennial 'it isn't up to Cole Porter's standard' and then you'd look in the score and see a lot of classics. Can-Can is the best example of that. But in the case of Les Girls Porter admitted this to be true. According to the George Eells biography of Porter, he was starting to suffer the decline in health that would eventually end his life in 1964. He did have surgery to bypass an ulcer and was not feeling up to par.Still the numbers are mostly for a vaudeville act, Barry Nichols and Les Girls so they're serviceable to a bright Rashomon like plot. The members of the act are Gene Kelly and the girls are Mitzi Gaynor, Taina Elg, and Kay Kendall. Kay's written a memoir that includes an alleged suicide attempt by Elg and she's suing her in an English court. As we get testimony from Elg, Kendall, and Kelly, they all give out with different versions. It's also clear he had his fling with all of them at one time despite his alleged no fraternization policy.Elg has the best ballad of the score, Ca C'est L'Amour which sounds like something that might have been written for Can-Can and discarded. Cole Porter discards are better than a lot of composer's best efforts. The sparkling Kay Kendall was never shown to better advantage on the screen than with You're Just Too Too in a duet with Kelly. And Cole Porter wickedly satirizes Marlon Brando and The Wild One in Why Am I So Gone About That Gal with Kelly and Mitzi Gaynor.In addition to this being Cole Porter's last film score, this film also marks Gene Kelly's last full blown musical. He did do other musical numbers in films like What A Way To Go and Young Girls From Rochefort and Xanadu, but this was the last musical he did. They were getting way too expensive to make, something Kelly learned from behind the camera when he directed Hello Dolly.Even with a score that Cole Porter himself wasn't thrilled with, Les Girls is still a fresh bit of film making. And since it's original to the screen, the Porter wit is not edited severely. All in all four great musical performers, three of them Les Girls.

Though made near the end of MGM's Golden years, LES GIRLS was a stylish and entertaining musical that brought to mind the Japanese tale "Rashoman" where we are given one story told from three very different points of view. The film opens with Lady Sybil Wren (the late great Kay Kendall), an elegant British bombshell, being taken to court for libel after the publication of a book she wrote about her experiences as the member of a song and dance troupe known as Les Girls. What we then get is a flashback where we meet Barry Nichols (Gene Kelly)the leader of the act and his girls, the aforementioned Sybil, a bubbly American named Joy (Mitzi Gaynor)and an exotic French beauty named Angele (Taina Elg). According to Sybil, Barry toyed with her affections, making her think he loved her, but Angele's version of the story reveals he made her feel the same way, but Barry, now married to Joy, does finally take the stand and tells his version of what happened, which is apparently what really happened. Stylish direction by George Cukor, a surprisingly meaty screenplay for an MGM musical, and some great musical sequences make for an offbeat but nonetheless richly entertaining film, which, if truth be told, is effortlessly stolen by Kay Kendall, whose luminous performance as Sybil lights up the screen, especially in a riotous comic duet she performs with Kelly called "You're Just Too Too.." Kendall was a supremely gifted actress taken from us much too soon and this film is ample proof of that. A nearly forgotten and underrated MGM classic.