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Movies / On DVD / Top Hat
Top Hat

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Top Hat (1935)

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Reviews Counted:36

Fresh:36

Rotten:0

Average Rating:8.7/10

Consensus: A glamorous and enthralling Depression-era diversion, Top Hat is nearly flawless, with acrobatics by Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers that make the hardest physical stunts seem light as air.

Runtime: 1 hr 43 mins

Genre: Musical & Performing Arts

Synopsis: A musical comedy full of high style, romance, mistaken identity... and Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dancing and singing 11 of Irving Berlin's best songs. When Jerry Travers meets lovely Dale... A musical comedy full of high style, romance, mistaken identity... and Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dancing and singing 11 of Irving Berlin's best songs. When Jerry Travers meets lovely Dale Tremont, it's love at first sight for him. Unfortunately, Dale's affections chill when she mistakenly believes he's her best friend's new husband. Now she's engaged to someone else... Will she find out Jerry's real identity before she goes ahead and makes a big mistake? [More]

Starring: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton, Helen Broderick

Starring: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton, Helen Broderick, Eric Blore, Erik Rhodes, Lucille Ball, Leonard Mudie

Director: Mark Sandrich

Director: Mark Sandrich
Producer: Pandro S. Berman
Screenwriter: Dwight Taylor, Allan Scott
Composer: Max Steiner

[See More Credits]

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Release:

Aug 16, 2005

[DVD Details]
 
 
  • Perhaps the best remembered of the 10 Astaire/Rogers musicals, Top Hat has it all: Art Deco elegance, a wonderfully addled storyline, loopy support from skilled farceurs and the incomparable chemistry of the two leads cheek-to-cheeking to Irving Berlin's finest film score.
  • It's a wake-up call for romance when Fred's exuberant No Strings dance in his hotel suite disturbs the sleeping beauty (Ginger) in the room below. They meet cute, Fred decides he'd like a few strings (preferably a tied knot) after all and love beckons until Ginger mistakenly gets the idea that Fred is a married playboy. But mistakes can be wonderfully, wackily resolved. Among the highlights: Fred mows down the chorus line in his signature Top Hat, White Tie and Tails, the shimmeringly dreamy Isn't It a Lovely Day (to Be Caught in the Rain)? and the rhapsodically tender Cheek to Cheek. Nominated for 4 Academy Awards including Best Picture, Top Hat is top-drawer entertainment magic.
  • Source: Warner Home Video
  •  
     
     
     

    Reviews for Top Hat

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    1 - 20 (sorted by date)
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    Arguably the classiest and funniest of the RKO Astaire-Rogers musicals.

    Full Review Source: Channel 4 Film | comment Comment
    04/24/09
    Channel 4 Film
    Top Critic Icon Top Critic

    If you want only one Astaire-Rogers musical, Top Hat is obligatory.

    Full Review Source: Empire Magazine | comment Comment
    04/24/09
    Empire Magazine
    Top Critic Icon Top Critic

    Finally, thanks more to Fred Astaire than any other single influence, the character of musicomedy in the cinema has now completely changed.

    Full Review Source: TIME Magazine | comment Comment
    04/24/09
    TIME Magazine
    Top Critic Icon Top Critic

    The fourth pairing of Astaire-Rogers is one of their best and RKO top grosser of the year.

    Full Review Source: EmanuelLevy.Com | comment Comment
    03/21/08
    Emanuel Levy
    Emanuel Levy
    EmanuelLevy.Com

    This one can't miss and the reasons are three -- Fred Astaire, Irving Berlin's 11 songs and sufficient comedy between numbers to hold the film together.

    Full Review Source: Variety | comment Comment
    01/11/08
    Variety Staff
    Variety Staff
    Variety
    Top Critic Icon Top Critic

    This 1935 musical finds Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers at the top of their form.

    Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
    01/11/08
    Don Druker
    Don Druker
    Chicago Reader
    Top Critic Icon Top Critic

    No review available.

    comment Comment
    02/06/07
    S. James Wegg
    S. James Wegg
    JWR

    Top Hat does not glorify wealth or upper class status - if anything it continually pokes fun at it.

    Full Review Source: Cinematic Reflections | comment Comment
    06/24/06
    Derek Smith
    Derek Smith
    Cinematic Reflections

    The third Astaire-Rogers movie and one of the best.

    Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
    02/09/06
    Tom Milne
    Tom Milne
    Time Out

    Because we are bound by gravity and the limitations of our bodies, because we live in a world where the news is often bad and the prospects disturbing, there is a need for another world somewhere, a world where Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers live.

    Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | comment Comment
    01/20/06
    Roger Ebert
    Roger Ebert
    Chicago Sun-Times
    Top Critic Icon Top Critic

    The plot is involving, especially as it builds to its seemingly impossible-to-solve finale.

    Full Review Source: Hollywood Reporter | comment Comment
    09/07/05
    Douglas Pratt
    Douglas Pratt
    Hollywood Reporter
    Top Critic Icon Top Critic

    ...even after seventy years, the same elements delight us all over again. Good songs, good dancing, and good stars never go out of style.

    Full Review Source: DVDTown.com | comment Comment
    08/03/05
    John J. Puccio
    John J. Puccio
    DVDTown.com

    Every musical number works, and the mistaken identity plot is pleasant enough, even if there's too much emphatic dithering from the supporting players towards the end.

    Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | comment Comment
    08/01/05
    Dan Callahan
    Dan Callahan
    Slant Magazine

    No review available.

    comment Comment
    07/07/05
    Joe Williams
    Joe Williams
    St. Louis Post-Dispatch

    One of the best of the Astaire-Rogers best.

    comment Comment
    12/28/04
    Steve Crum
    Steve Crum
    Kansas City Kansan

    Fred and Ginger's best.

    comment Comment
    12/21/04
    Eric Lurio
    Eric Lurio
    Greenwich Village Gazette

    Heaven.

    comment Comment
    09/17/04
    Nell Minow
    Nell Minow
    Movie Mom at Yahoo! Movies

    No review available.

    comment Comment
    07/28/04
    Daniel M. Kimmel
    Daniel M. Kimmel
    Worcester Telegram & Gazette

    No review available.

    comment Comment
    06/11/04
    Rob Blackwelder
    Rob Blackwelder
    SPLICEDWire

    The quintessential Fred-and-Ginger vehicle… typically escapist Depression-era fare… [but] whenever Fred and Ginger are in motion, the magic is timeless.

    Full Review Source: Decent Films Guide | comment Comment
    12/26/03
    Steven D. Greydanus
    Steven D. Greydanus
    Decent Films Guide
     
     
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