A house in heaven
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | A house in heaven |
| Original title | Cabin in the Sky |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1943 |
| length | 98 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Vincente Minnelli |
| script | Joseph cabinet |
| production |
Arthur Freed for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| music |
Roger Edens , Vernon Duke George Bassman , Hall Johnson |
| camera | Sidney Wagner |
| cut | Harold F. Kress |
| occupation | |
| |
A House in the Sky is an American fantasy musical from 1943. It is a film adaptation of Vernon Duke's successful Broadway musical Cabin in the Sky from 1940. The film is significant as a directorial debut for Vincente Minnelli and one of the earliest costly ones Films with an exclusively African American cast. In Germany, the film was first shown on television on May 7, 1994.
action
Little Joe Jackson has lived a dissolute life and only worries his Christian wife, Petunia. In the dispute over gambling debts, he is finally shot. As his wife prays for him, Heavenly powers restore Little Joe. He is given a total of six months to change his life in such a way that he is worthy of heaven - if not, he belongs to hell. With the help of The General , an angel, Little Joe changes the way he lives: He becomes a kind, working person who is now a good husband to his wife Petunia. So everything is going perfectly, but Hell also wants to pull Little Joe on its side: The demon Lucifer Jr., son of the devil himself, is given the task of leading Little Joe back to a sinful life.
Lucifer Jr. ensures that Little Joe becomes a wealthy man by winning a lottery. Then he seduces Little Joe into a lavish, cocky life. In the end, Little Joe leaves his wife for the beautiful Georgia Brown, who is only interested in his money. When Georgia and Little Joe are sitting in a nightclub one evening, Petunia appears and tries to win her husband back. She succeeds, but before they can leave the nightclub, Little Joe and Petunia die in a shootout. The General , angry at the intervention of Hell, destroys the nightclub. While Petunia can be taken to heaven without any problems, her husband Little Joe is denied entry. But Georgia is so appalled by the tragedy that it changes and bequeaths Little Joe's entire fortune to the Church for good causes. In addition there is also the pleading of Little Joe, who finally recognized his mistakes and wanted to improve his life. Finally, he is taken to heaven at the side of his wife.
At the end of the film, Little Joe awakens from a dream: In the initial shooting, he was not killed, only injured; his encounters with angels and demons were only feverish dreams. Enriched by these experiences and converted to a better person, Little Joe now wants to start a new happy life with Petunia.
background
A Cottage in Heaven was an unusual production for the 1940s because only African American actors appear in the film. Although there were already films with an exclusively African-American cast, these were mostly shot as cheap independent films . With A House in Heaven , however, MGM, which was perhaps the largest film studio in Hollywood at the time, was behind it, and the film received a very decent budget with almost 700,000 US dollars. Many of the most famous African American artists of the time made an appearance in the film based on the hit Broadway musical Cabin in the Sky . Nevertheless, MGM viewed the film as a risk, as some cinema owners in America, which was strongly racist at the time, found it difficult to imagine showing an “Afro-American film” - it was also to be feared that almost only African-Americans were interested in the film. In the end, however, A House in Heaven was a financial success for MGM with revenues of almost two million US dollars, which paved the way for further productions of this kind.
The partly world-famous Afro-Americans of the film were initially forbidden to eat in the dining hall of the MGM studios. When studio boss Louis B. Mayer found out about it, however, he invited the actors to his home for dinner. The following day everyone was allowed to eat in the studio dining room.
The production of the film was taken over by the musical specialist Arthur Freed , who was responsible for numerous musical film classics of the 1940s and 1950s. The then 40-year-old Vincente Minnelli made his directorial debut : The son of an Italian-American musical conductor had initially worked as a stage and costume designer for Broadway shows, and later he became artistic director of the Radio City Music Hall in New York. Arthur Freed then piloted him to Hollywood for MGM, where he worked on several Mickey Rooney / Judy Garland films in the early 1940s . Arthur Freed was so satisfied with the finished film A House in the Film that they both subsequently made films together such as Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) or An American in Paris (1951). Minnelli became one of the most important musical directors in Hollywood history.
Dancer Bill Bailey performs the first moonwalk in film history in A House in Heaven , between minutes 50 and 52.
Awards
The song Happiness Is a Thing Called Joe , written by Harold Arlen and EY Harburg , sung by Ethel Waters in the film, received an Oscar nomination for Best Song .
criticism
When it was first published in 1943, A House in Heaven received mostly positive reviews. Bosley Crowther wrote in the New York Times, for example, that it was "plenty of entertainment" and particularly praised the achievements of the actors and singers. The German website Cinema found the film to be a "snappy classic of black cinema ". The lexicon of international films was cautiously positive: "Despite a rather clumsy direction, the musical and dance performance of a visibly enthusiastic ensemble is interesting."
Web links
- A cottage in the sky in theInternet Movie Database(English)