Ten years before the home video explosion of the 1980s and decades before TCM and YouTube brought the full measure of film history into our homes, MGM studios mined their rich archive to create what amounted to an elegant two-hour clip package honoring its own illustrious history of musical film. The resulting picture was That’s Entertainment, a joyful trip down memory lane whose success is widely credited with kickstarting mainstream cultural interest in Hollywood films of the golden age and once and for all insuring the studio’s awareness of the value of their history. After years of decline marked by personnel shifts, mounting losses, and a destablizing lack of cohesive corporate strategy, (including selling off parcels of its historic backlot and its props, costumes, and memorablia), MGM coffers swelled, albeit briefly, with the release of That’s Entertainment and the template for the proper valuation of ancient copyrights was minted for all time in the stockholder’s favorite color: green. The new introductory segments that were filmed to organize the film clips were hosted by an elite group of MGM alumni like Frank Sinatra, Debbie Reynolds, Peter Lawford, Elizabeth Taylor, Mickey Rooney, Fred Astaire, James Stewart, Bing Crosby, and Gene Kelly. I find it […]
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