RED ENVELOPES: Who Could Ask For Anything More? Um...

There's still lingering outrage over the fact that Crash provided one of only two shocks at this year's Oscars (the other coming courtesy of our good friends in the Three 6 Mafia, for their trenchant analysis of the difficulties inherent in modern-day pimping) by toppling the favored Brokeback Mountain in the race for Best Picture. I haven't seen Brokeback, so I can't honestly weigh in on the relative merits of the two films (I liked Crash, although people who didn't like it seem to absolutely despise it). But I can say this: if you're one of those people who think it's simply unconscionable that the Oscar went to the wrong film, then you simply must get over yourself. After all, in 1952, they passed over A Streetcar Named Desire and gave Best Picture to An American in Paris.

I had high hopes for this movie, having just watched an episode of American Masters on the genius of Gene Kelly. Plus, the very next collaboration between Kelly and producer Arthur Freed was Singin' in the Rain, which is only the greatest musical in the history of the cinema. As the final cherry on the sundae, the film is a showcase for the music of George Gershwin. We ought to be able to get a decent film out of all this, right? Maybe not a Best Picture, but certainly a respectable entertainment.

So imagine my shock at the discovery that this winner of seven Academy Awards was not an especially good film. It's a beautiful confection, with charming sets, elaborate costumes, and outstanding choreography. And Gershwin's music is performed to the hilt, a real tribute to the composer and his lyricist, brother Ira Gershwin. But the story on which all this decoration is hung is a dud.

Not the least of the problems is with our hero, an aspiring painter (Kelly) selling his wares on the streets of Paris. Turns out he's a jerk, as he toys with the affections of a would-be patron (a terribly abused Nina Foch) while he really pines for a lovely gamine named Lise (Leslie Caron in her movie debut). Kelly takes Foch's money and support, yanking her chain while he pursues Caron with methods that today would probably get him slapped with a restraining order. (And that works!) At times, it's infuriating to watch him mooning over the girl who brushes him off and complaining about the woman who pesters him, while he isn't really deserving of either one. And it's while you're annoyed with him that Kelly lapses into a song-and-dance number, thereby working his way back into your good graces. Kudos for agreeing to play a near-heel. But hearty boos to the filmmakers (I'll single out screenwriter Alan Jay Lerner) for making that heel the guy we're supposed to be rooting for. The love-hate relationship the film creates with its protagonist is enough to give you whiplash.

At least Kelly is central to the film. But the film starts us off by assigning importance to characters who will not earn their billing. We spend a great deal of time being introduced to Adam (pianist and raconteur Oscar Levant), a fellow expatriate American, and Henri (French singer Georges Guétary), a French singer who is actually engaged to Lise. Let me be clear about this: these characters don't matter. Henri is interesting as a plot complication, but he's hardly deserving of the leading man status afforded him here. (In a movie like The Awful Truth, Henri would be the Ralph Bellamy character. You don't make Ralph Bellamy one of your leads.) And Adam has no real role to play at all, other than being the outside observer. (This is the Thelma Ritter part.) They're genuine, actual supporting characters, advancing the threadbare plot while meaning very little to us. So why does Guétary get to stop the show for his performance of "Stairway to Paradise"? Because he can sing, and we've got a Gershwin song to showcase. Why does Levant bring the film to a screeching halt with his one-man symphony in Gershwin's Concerto in F? Because he was quite the piano player, and we've got just the piece to demonstrate his talents. It's a whole melting pot of irrelevance, and it's hard to figure out why audiences sat still for it. (Levant does get off one of the funniest lines I've heard in quite some time. Trying to change a touchy subject, he comes up with this winner: "Hey, did I ever tell you about the time I played a command performance for Hitler?" That line alone almost earned his keep.)

Leslie Caron is what we call a fetching ingenue. She's got bold, Audrey Hepburn eyes (with strangely Vulcan eyebrows), she dances divinely...and she has staggeringly little personality. Other than being pretty, it's hard to see what has Kelly so enraptured. I'm not sure Caron was even 20 yet when this movie was made, and that immaturity shows. Lise hardly seems like a person ready to make a life decision. There's nothing weighing her down. When she is finally freed to pursue her heart, there's no release, no culmination. She looks like a girl who has just been released from being grounded.

I can't hate the film, because the songs are too good, and the dances are too outstanding. The standout is the title tune itself, adapted into a 15-minute ballet at the film's conclusion. Naturally, it has very little to do with the film itself, but it's a sterling set piece for Kelly's dancing. Curious, too, is the fact that a similar dance piece in Singin' in the Rain -- the "Broadway Melody" sequence -- is even more poorly integrated into the film, and yet it works better. I don't get that. I guess it's because Singin' in the Rain is a much better movie. I'm willing to cut it more slack.

The fact that An American in Paris was a triumph and Singin' in the Rain was a relative failure speaks poorly of the tastes of moviegoers in the early 1950s. The fact that their fortunes have reversed over time is entirely appropriate. And should be of some small comfort to those movie fans who feel that their gay cowboys didn't get their due. Don't worry, folks. Film justice is slow, but you can count on it.