Anything But Love

Anything But Love

“Anything But Love” is a new movie in the style of late-night TV musicals. The color scheme resembles a newborn Technicolor, and the plot pays homage to classic Hollywood romance. It features formulaic songs, and it was made by people who have an affection for such movies. Those who do not share this love will see it as cliched and predictable, but they won’t get it.

Remember that guy Oscar Levant always played? The one who never got the heroine but secretly loved her? The only original thing about “Anything But Love” is that Oscar Levant finally gets the girl. She’s flame-haired Billie Golden (Isabel Rose), whom I would be willing to place money on being named for Billie Holiday and the Golden Age of MGM musicals. She sings torchy standards in a tacky motel supper club at the “JFK Skytel,” where she works hard enough to be loved by Sal (Victor Argo). He’s grizzled and old, owns the place, has to change formats because business is bad.

That he plays the owner is almost too good to be true; that his name is Sal goes without saying; that he’s also Laney’s (Alix Korey) live-in boyfriend says Rose and director Robert Cary have watched too many late shows, although it must be admitted she has another job: Waitress at a high-class club headlining Eartha Kitt playing herself.

In an early shot, we frame Billie’s face in the round window of the door between kitchen and showroom as she yearningly watches Kitt this shot is obligatory in all movies about waitresses who want to be stars. Times are hard for Billie and her mom (also hits bottle). Sal doesn’t want to fire her but suggests a compromise: She might keep working if she accompanies herself on piano; she signs up for lessons but finds out Elliot (Andrew McCarthy), her new teacher, is the same jerk who sabotaged her at an audition by screwing up accompaniment. Of course they hate each other; this is essential so that they can love each other later.

Another possible path Billie could take: Greg Ellenbogen (Cameron Bancroft) has come back into her life. He was the high school hunk she had a crush on, now a 30ish success story who has lots of money and decides (as a logical exercise, I think) that he should get married. They court, get engaged; she will be financially secure, and her dream of becoming a chanteuse can be forgotten as she raises their children and sings oh, at parties and benefits and stuff like that.

Is there a person alive who doesn’t know whether Billie chooses Greg or Elliot? But of course there must be enormous obstacles and pitfalls along the way, not to mention those kinds of overblown fantasy scenes much beloved of old musicals, where everything ratchets up six degrees into dreamy schmaltz before finally ending with a closeup of the heroine’s face as she comes back to earth.

The character Andrew McCarthy is living in a poorly furnished walk-up studio apartment, is bitter and negative, does not know his worth and is essentially the same person as the Oscar Levant character. He should have chain-smoked with that cigarette dangling from his lips while he played. When they said he might move to Paris I thought: duh! He wants to be Gene Kelly’s roommate in “An American in Paris.”

It is not perfect. Shot on a budget closer to minimum wage than most people’s annual salary, it has the usual problem of crowd scenes without enough people in them. But it loves what it does, and so do we. Eartha Kitt has just a tiny role, but it works beautifully: She sings a song (super well) and dispenses the advice that needs to be dispensed in any plot of this kind. Was that her idea? Or did the filmmakers ask her to avoid getting all sentimental about it and instead remind Billie that she’s the star and Billie is the waitress? I love that moment.

A real mistake: There is a wedding scene (I won’t say who with or whether it’s even real no, don’t think that’s a clue). And just when it should explode into fantasy and imaginings at precisely that point, where you can never play too many emotions straight it stays tartly true to itself and goes for gags instead. But mostly this movie just works whatever way its heart desires; you either dig it for that or you’re one of those people who hear names like Kathryn Grayson, Doris Day, Howard Keel, Dennis Morgan, Ann Miller, Jack Carson, Ann Blyth and Gordon MacRae without much meaning being conveyed.

Watch Anything But Love For Free On Gomovies.