Defintely see The Band Wagon, when you get the chance. The Girl Hunt would make a strong claim to greatest dance sequence ever. It’s also one of the craziest and funniest. Plus, I swear there’s a moment, during the blue outfit sequence, where Fred Astaire cops a feel. :) OK, OK, he probably doesn’t. But it’s a close call.

The advantage of actually picking up the DVD is that as an extra it has a great Cyd dance routine called “Two-Faced Woman. ” Another MGM star performed the song in a different musical around the same time, so the routine got nixed in this film. But it’s an amazingly intricate solo dance. And she wears possibly the sexiest outfit you will ever see her in. That’s saying something.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0ePfbiElmo&feature=related

The Band Wagon was given Essential status back when Peter Bogdanovich hosted The Essentials. Do they keep a record of which films have been given Essential status? It’s another list, this time non-AFI, to keep track of…

Seriously, Gene Kelly tap dancing in roller skates. Come on!

Like Hegwig, I’ve only ever seen Cyd Charisse in Singin’ In the Rain, and a few brief clips, so Monday I’ll get to fill in a major gap in my education.

It makes me sad that so many legends are almost forgotten now. That many people don’t even know who she is, or was. But the cinephiles will remember her.

CYD CHARISSE was beyond gorgeous. Her dancing talent was profound and unsurpassed. She moved like a dark, exotic cat and every single second she was on screen she was mesmerizing.

My uncle was in love with her his whole life. Takes me back a few years because I remember how he used to talk about her in wide eyed wonder.

Now they’re both gone.

RIP, Ms. Charisse. You will surely be missed…

http://antidisartsandent.blogspot.com/2008/06/cyd-charisse-rest-in-peace.html

In The Band Wagon she and Astaire put up two of the shortlisters for greatest movie dance routines with Dancing in the Dark and The Girl Hunt Ballet within maybe an hour of film time of each other.

As I say in my post, she was practically a human special effect.

She was quite a sight as you say, Craig. Loved her contributions to the three films mentioned here thus far (It’s Always Fair Weather, Singin’ in the Rain and The Band Wagon). I also liked her a good deal in numerous other films, including Mervyn LeRoy’s East Side, West Side and Minnelli’s Two Weeks in Another Town. (As a side note, I say “bah” to a certain blogger who shall not be named who recently attacked LeRoy’s entire output even though he does have at least a handful of genuine classics to his name. Same blogger used Stan Winston’s death as a way to bash one of the films on which he worked. Bah to that as well.)

It’s Singing in the Rain in case you haven’t guessed.

RIP, Cyd.