What makes it different from others?

It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

It's sentimental favorite time here on Hot Toasty Rag. I'm sure everyone has their own favorite Judy Garland impersonator, but at my house, there's no comparison to my mom. And while she has been known to wave her hands in the air during "The Man That Got Away" or "I Could Go On Singing," it's "The Trolley Song" from Meet Me in St. Louis that is her signature Judy Garland performance. Years before watching the movie for the first time, I knew the "Clang Clang Clang" song by heart because of my mom. Therefore, my review for Meet Me in St. Louis is going to be unapologetically biased. Ironically, she doesn't even really like the movie! I'm the one who insists on keeping our VHS copy.Judy Garland, Lucille Bremer, and Margaret O'Brien are sisters in an all-American family in the early 1900s. Judy and Lucille have romantic problems to worry about, and Margaret doesn't always play nice with the other neighborhood kids. Add in Marjorie Main, the family's grumpy maid, two other children, a father-in-law, and a new invention called the telephone, and both parents, Leon Ames and Mary Astor, have their hands full! The film is chock-full of songs, with old-fashioned standards like the title song and "Under the Bamboo Tree," as well as new songs for the film, including "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." While the movie is upbeat and fun, it's also a little sad; Judy sings the Christmas song to a sobbing Margaret who has just destroyed her own snowman. I always feel sorry for Leon Ames's character in the film. Not only is he overrun by females in the house, but he's constantly put down, stifled, criticized, and left out of important family discussions. At that time, the turn of the 20th century, men were believed to rule their own roosts, but maybe they didn't. Meet Me in St. Louis is such a heartwarming piece of Americana; maybe it was realistic for the father figure to have less of a say in his house than the overwhelming majority. In any case, my heart still goes out to Leon, a character actor who was normally overlooked.I love this one, despite the sadness, because there were so many famous moments I was taught as a kid and looked forward to seeing for the first time onscreen after years of build-up. This might not wind up be your favorite Judy Garland movie, but you can rent it and see if you like it.

The movie covers four seasons between the summer of 1903 and the spring of 1904. Based upon the recollections of Sally Benson (who wrote for the "New Yorker," 1941-1942), the spotlight is on the upbeat lives of the upper middle class Smith family that, residing in a suburban St. Louis Edwardian house, includes patriarch Alonzo Smith (Leon Ames), wife Anna (Mary Astor), four daughters, an uneventful son (Henry H. Daniels, Jr.), a wisecracking grandpa (Harry Davenport), and even an imperturbable housekeeper, Katie (Marjorie Main). The main excitement is, of course, the announcement that St. Louis will host the 1904 World's Fair (Louisiana Exposition, the centennial of the Louisiana Purchase). The other story lines mostly focus on three of the Smith daughters. For two older girls (Esther and Rose) the emphasis is, of course, on romance. At dinnertime, twenty year-old Rose (Lucille Bremer) gets a long distance telephone call from her boyfriend in New York, waiting for a proposal that never comes. Seventeen year-old Esther (twenty-two year-old Judy Garland) falls in love with the boy next door, John Truett (Tom Drake). For the youngest girl, Tootie (Margaret O'Brien), a little terror, the focal point is on mischief, especially on Halloween. But the biggest threat of the happy existence of the family is the announcement of the patriarch, a successful attorney, after he arrives home from work on Halloween evening. Mr. Smith notifies his family that he will accept a job promotion to New York City effective January 1904. Uprooting the family's comfortable existence will shatter everyone's dreams as the Smiths are intrinsically linked to St. Louis, the heart of Midwest America. Expertly directed by Vincente Minnelli, "Meet Me in St. Louis" is one of the most beautiful musicals ever created, despite its formulaic storyline (not unusual among musicals anyway). Minnelli's eye for period detail is stunning. There are the impeccable sets (like the colorful rooms in the Smith house and the electrical lighting of the Fair), music score, early twentieth century costumes, and first-rate artistic performances. In particular, dark-eyed and auburn-haired Judy Garland danced, sang, and looked as well as she ever did. Charming with old-time innocence, the film's musical scores are almost beyond comparison ("The Trolley Song," "Skip to My Lou," "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," etc.). Note how deftly Director Minnelli handles the change from scene to song back to scene without skipping a beat. In fact, the songs are integrated with the storyline. Minnelli loved gorgeous color, especially red motifs. Note the shiny red automobile at the very beginning, reddish wallpaper, the family room table lamp, grandpa's fez, the hall bench seat across from the upstairs bathroom, the milk pitcher, the small rose wall picture, and the homemade ketchup. Then there are Judy Garland's winter dress and ruby red lipstick. Color red is also prominent in the four framed prints – sepia photographs that come alive in color – that herald each season. Each frame has its own character and does remind one of the Americana of Courier and Ives. The arrangement was probably copied five years later by Mervyn LeRoy in his "Little Women." As the coming-of-age members react to each predicament, there is that undertone of adieus that will change the family forever. Then there is that hint of a complex world (the Exposition itself) descending around the Smiths that foretell the end of the simple ways of the good old days (the period before World War I). But for the next few months the Smith family will be at its peak and the changes will be slight. It is the World's Fair that will garner attention. After all, as Esther remarks at the end, "I can't believe it, right here where we live, right here in St. Louis."

If you want a five letter word for "the perfect musical", here is your title, a film so sentimental yet true to the human desire for home and roots that even today it remains fresh and alive, colorful and magnetic in every way. Of course, it will always be remembered as the film which first paired Judy Garland and director Vincent Minnelli (although he was the one responsible for the "Our Love Affair" fruit/cake orchestra in "Strike Up the Band!") and the film which moved her from black and white ingénue into one of MGM's most photographic Technicolor ladies. It will also be remembered as the film which moved rising child star Margaret O'Brien into the realm of Judy's past as MGM's greatest young actress and for the many beautiful songs which were written for it in its translation onto the screen. There's even the unfortunately short-lived but much loved 1990 Broadway musical version of it which had been trailing around as a touring production for years before being perfected for the Great White Way. A T.V. series was also developed years later when MGM moved into that medium, but nothing can top the wedding cake of perfection that is this salute to the early part of the 20th Century when state fairs (like one perfected in song by Rodgers and Hammerstein the following year) were must-visit attractions and "courting" was the way young lovers romanced each other-by gaslight!From the moment that Judy pokes her head out the window to sing her love of "The Boy Next Door", you know that her future as a maturing leading lady looks brighter than ever. Gone are the Mickey Rooney "Let's put on a show!" films, and even if she does put on a show here (in an impromptu duet with Ms. O'Brien), it's much more believable, as it is part of a house party where Judy does more than her share of trying to catch the eye of that particular boy, played here by the handsome Tom Drake. Her parents are played by Leon Ames and Mary Astor, and if it is at first jarring to see the vixen of "The Maltese Falcon" playing a house frau, just remember that she had played Judy's mother once before: in "Listen, Darling!"."Older sister" Lucille Bremer was Arthur Freed's big attempt to create a new leading lady, and while she's a likable young actress, she seems lost when shown on screen with the magnetic Judy and the perky Margaret. Then, there's the beloved "grandpa", played by that old rascal, Harry Davenport, and the family's cranky but lively maid, Marjorie Main, who dominates the kitchen (and her ketchup recipe) much like Mary Wickes would do almost a decade later in two Booth Tarkington similar stories, "On Moonlight Bay" and "By the Light of the Silvery Moon". Ironically, in the big Broadway musical, another MGM leading lady of the 1940's, Betty Garrett, would assume that part, stealing every moment she was on screen.The story is a simple one: Papa Ames wants to move the family from St. Louis to New York and their desire is to remain there for the upcoming world's fair. O'Brien goes homicidal, burying her dolls and killing the snowmen, which leads to a comforting scene where Judy serenades the sobbing girl with "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas". It should be noted that the original lyrics of that Christmas standard were much darker than what was heard on screen, yet perfectly in tuned with the sometimes darkened theme of the story. Such is the case with the Halloween sequence where O'Brien must "assassinate" the town grouch by pelting him with flour. You wouldn't see anything like this in a Greer Garson movie!Once Judy steps onto a streetcar for the famous "Trolley Song", you've got the stuff that show business legends are made of. The team of Arthur Freed and Vincent Minnelli produced and directed some of Judy's finest works, and Minnelli proves that he is an artist in every way, making the film look as if it was taken right out of Currier and Ives. There's a big rousing version of "Skip to My Lou!" (which features a young June Lockhart amongst its dancers) and a sweet duet between Ames and Astor who re-establish their own love as they watch their growing children discover their first.While the World's Fair sequence is only briefly presented in the finale, it is the dramatic story leading up to it which makes this magical in every way. Simple times, maybe never as simple as this presents, yet still lovely, and something many audiences yearn for today, just like Judy sang with "Over the Rainbow". Sumstuous costumes, lavish sets and rousing songs make this a delight from start to finish which the newer generations have brought into their hearts and cherished to make a family tradition for decades to come, and hopefully much longer.

Next to "Easter Parade", "Meet Me In St. Louis" is my favourite Judy Garland vehicle from the MGM film-factory days. Chock full of those freshly scrubbed, wholesome family values that Hollywood used to love to propagate (if not necessarily emulate), the picture is a warm, endearing fantasy with just enough realism to keep it out of the treacle jar. Opening in the summer of 1904, it starts innocently enough with Esther Smith (Judy Garland) mooning over boy next door John Truitt (Tom Drake), older sister Rose (Lucille Bremer) pining for Warren Sheffield (Robert Sully) with everyone happily laughing and singing about the impending world's fair coming to St. Louis next spring. So far, so predictably good. But then the plot gets seriously leavened as we are introduced to Tootie Smith (Margaret O'Brien), the youngest sister of the clan whose girlish pranks and blood-curdling prose mix a little comedy with some genuinely mean-spirited Halloween behavior that take us to the darker side of human nature, adding some much needed sinister malevolence when it is most needed. But there's more as the plot thickens still further when patriarch Alonzo Smith (Leon Ames) imperiously (albeit with the best of intentions) informs everyone, the day following Halloween, that the family is leaving St. Louis for New York. Initially laughed off, this unexpected announcement turns out to be one post-Halloween trick that is no treat as nobody, wife Anna (Mary Astor) included, is much amused. "I don't believe it!" "It's true: I'm to start the first of the year. We'll leave right after Christmas." With noteworthy attention to period detail, the film is brilliantly directed by Vincent Minnelli, trumpets some excellent acting from its ensemble cast, and includes an engaging Ralph Blane/Hugh Martin score that, for the first time in motion picture history integrates the songs directly into the plot, something pioneered for the stage a year earlier by Rodgers and Hammerstein when "Oklahoma" premiered on Broadway. Better yet, "Meet Me In St. Louis" also deftly combines Christmas candy and homespun virtue with the contemporary reality of the danger of making the business agenda, the bottom line, the sole arbitrator of what really counts, even if that wasn't the film's original purpose. Indeed, with the Smith's standing in for all of us, the movie is not just an enjoyable, warm/fuzzies romp through a bygone era. It is also a timely reminder that even the best of well intentioned actions can elicit unforeseen responses, that people, not impersonal automatons, are the final repository of all human actions, noble, imperious or mean-spirited.