best movie i've ever seen.

Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

A load of bland blokes take up lots of screen time along with an annoying boy and an annoying girl who do some skating. The only reason to watch this film is for Belita. She stars as herself in a film about a company trying to keep onto her as their star attraction for their show. She skates and looks good as always but I wish she had been given a better story.If you like skating, Eugene Turner also turns up as himself and partners Belita on the ice. We have some songs thrown in – not particularly memorable but OK – and we also have the required morale-boosting ending about the Navy where everyone gets to wear a navy Captain's hat. Cool.

The tall, gorgeous ice skater Belita, who was also a wonderful ballerina, stars in this skateathon, "Silver Skates," that has a story here and there. Basically, an ice show owner (Patricia Morison) is desperate to save her show, which will fail badly once Belita leaves to get married. Help comes in the form of a pint-sized war orphan from Holland.It's really kind of an amateur hour, saved by the glorious Belita, the beautiful Patricia Morison, and Frank Faylen, whom I've always loved. Frick and Frack did comedy skating -- which in fact is incredibly difficult to do, but today one just feels like fast-forwarding through it. Some of the skating numbers were on the boring side.Gene Turner, a two-time national figure skating champion, was the other skating star. I took one look at him and said, "That's the man who doubled for Cary Grant in 'The Bishop's Wife.'" I was right - you can't see a film 100 times and not recognize the skating double. Turner toured with Sonja Henie, was a U.S. medal winner in single skating, pairs skating, and ice dancing, worked as a coach for 60 years, and also wrote a column for a skating magazine. He never competed in the Olympics because during his years of competition, the Olympics were subject to cancellation due to World War II, plus he was busy flying 60 missions over France.So much accomplishment. Monogram didn't deserve them. Not too much else to say, except that Belita should have been with MGM.

Monogram offers us Belita, Monogram's answer to Sonia Henjie. Not that anyone was asking, considering that Miss Henjie was given Lucky Humberstone as a director by this time. As others have noted, Belita seems more the girl who would get what a man was driving at, and RKO's Leslie Goodwins was hired to direct this movie, so it doesn't stink on ice. However, there's not much in the way of script or good songs, and they got Kenny Baker as the young singer. He was okay in the movie version of THE MIKADO, but W.S. Gilbert never had much respect for tenors. Mr. Baker justifies his faith here as he doesn't always bother to match his lips to the words he is singing.That leaves Frick and Frack. These skating clowns have lingered in my mind, even though, so far as I know, I had never heard of them -- it seemed like the sort of name two tummelers, slapstick comedians from the Catskills would have. It turns out that's what they were, and I don't know where I know them from. Perhaps they played the Neverle one summer when I was four and I remember nothing but the funny names. They're actually pretty good.That's the best that can be said for this movie. Like most Monograms, it's fast, it doesn't strain the brain and it's over soon enough. I assume that's how the director felt, because for his next movie, he was back at the comparative luxury of RKO directing Leon Errol in "The Mexican Spitfire's Elephant".

The sublime, the ridiculous and the annoying all get a run in this Monogram dazzler made as a mid war morale booster. BELITA, the Brit skate star who reigned as she skated at Monogram for 5 years was an absolutely gorgeous woman, and her appearances in the musicals like this one and LADY LETS DANCE are simply sensational. Also see SUSPENSE and THE GANGSTER both also made at Monogram for a feast and a fest. She is the best thing about this musical jumble; the worst is mannequin-man and whiny singer Kenny Baker... he is so wooden and his Dagwood looks have always left me cold... colder than the slabs Belita zooms across showing us her crotch. Repeatedly.... The annoying is the haphazard production which often seemed filmed in a corner of the studio.... odd short sets that are just a corner with a door, or big production numbers in a deep narrow set. This film has a truly terrible script and a lot of forced romance. Coupled with bad acting and a remote Pat Morison as the female lead actress, SILVER SKATES only works in the terrific musical skate production numbers... fortunately there are many. Though some are oddly dressed and choreographed... skaters arrive and leave in the background without performing, some wear too many clothes, others in groups wear similar ballgowns but are a razzle of colors and patterns, so it just looks like everyone grabbed anything they could and all rushed on to the ice in a mess of every costume hanging out the back... It actually looks like a suburban church production with costumes from a charity jumble sale. In one big number, compete with santasnow, wet bedsheets, a pine tree and cardboard igloos, we have a bevy of skating chorus girls, a fab kid skater, a penguin and an seal. The penguin wanders about all through two numbers and the viewers eye is constantly distracted from the skate show to see which direction the penguin has wandered off to. At one moment a rush of skating chorus girls just crashes straight into him... and the cameras keep rolling and the poor little thing just wobbles about between their legs. No wildlife wrangler at Monogram! There are two children who skate in this film and they are equally excellent. The big finale, which for no reason is a "battleship extravaganza" features squadrons of skaters in (hooray) matching outfits... but it is filmed from another suburb... the camera is so far away from the 'big set' for a lot of the 'big moments' that we are left wondering why there is 7000 acres of wet white ice in front of the show. The closeups of BELITA and her adagio, whizz-bye-s are excellent and as always she is sexy and sensational. It actually looks like a very cheap high school version of the massive Elanor Powell number from the finale of BORN TO DANCE. But this is a Monogram Picture and as such it is their 'biggie for'43'.... and should be enjoyed as such..... but try finding reason or cohesion in the array of dance numbers of what on earth type of show would manage an excuse for the order they come in or why they are presented. The actual fun in this musical is the mish mash of it all. Then you are truly ready for their SWING PARADE OF 1946 which has a crammed jammed and flung-at-you musical finale more in common with Cole Slaw than Cole Porter.