Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day Twenty-Nine: Another Dose of Double D Action

In today's world that has lost its innocence if a film was released today called 100 Men and a Girl and the poster says of its leading lady, 'she thrills you again', you'd immediately think that it was a dodgy top shelf release. Although in the more innocent times of the mid-1930s, 100 Men and a Girl was another film in the cannon of Deanna Durbin who I previously became aware of when I watched Three Smart Girls. As Durbin had a constant stream of films released I'm guessing most of them had a similar theme in which adults got in trouble and Durbin saved the day. In Three Smart Girls she had help from her on-screen sisters here she is all on her own. The film sees Durbin's Patricia help out her father, an out-of-work trombonist by helping to organise an orchestra for unemployed musicians with the help of a rich old lady named Mrs. Frost. However, the day the orchestra is about to begin Mrs. Frost goes away and it is Mr. Frost, who is unaware of the situation, who Patricia turns to but he turns her away thinking that it is also some kind of pratical joke set-up by one of his rich friends. The film has many cases of mistaken identity and Patricia generally saving the day eventually getting famous conductor Leopold Stowtski (playing himself) to postpone a European tour so Mr. Frost will be appeased and the orchestra can go on. So Durbin saves the day and everybody is happy

Just as with Three Smart Girls, there are several opportunities for Durbin to break out into song and because this film is all about music she sings quite a fair bit. There's no denying that Durbin has a fine pair of lungs on her but it just seems that it splits up the narrative structure a little bit. There is also a taxi driver who keeps popping up throughout the film and just keeps driving Patricia around and singing to himself. Although I wasn't much for Three Smart Girls I at least found it bearable but 100 Men and A Girl is shorter and has less of a plot. But for some reason it was nominated for five Oscars including Best Picture. The others were for Editing and script (both underseved) and. for a film all about music, it was nominated for sound recording and won best score for Charles Previn a composer who had almost 400 credits to his name between 1936 and 1966. I also wasn't aware at the time I watched the film, that Stowtski was actually a composer and famously conducted most of the music in Disney's Fantasia. Durbin was one of those stars who stopped working after her childhood was behind her, so thankfully I won't have to watch any more of her singing and generally saving the day.