Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Best movie of this year hands down!

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This 1933 film based on a novel of the same name is the first of many setting the theme of an Iowa state fair in Olden Days a slice of life in which many people expect many things to experience unexpected turns taking each in different directions. Laid back idealist Will Rogers is married to work and worry all day Louise Dressler in another brilliant portrayal of the couple as leads. Oscar winning daughter Janet Gaynor leads an ensemble cast in which no performer is written for a stronger role focus than is the other. She is unwillingly courted by Lew Ayres who in the end convinces her he can make her happy. Her brother is future director Norman Foster who interestingly enough in pre code film says racy lines not again permissible in Hollywood for generations yet never strips off his street clothes for the camera which seems more the norm once racier language and inferences ended with the Hays code. He is helped out of a jam by Sally Eilers, a hard boiled circus girl who wants from him a good time only while she works this gig. There is very strong panning photography of the farm and fair scenes which add visual interest as well as solid ensemble acting by the tight cast. The musical which premiered 12 years later with a lot of the 1933 dialogue between musical interludes features a score by Rodgers and Hammerstein perhaps the only one not opening as a stage musical. An enticing slice of life for those who remember this era brilliantly filmed.

STATE FAIR (Fox, 1933), directed by Henry King, the original screen adaptation to Phil Stong's popular 1932 novel, stars Janet Gaynor and Will Rogers, the studio's top box-office attractions, for the first and only time. Basically an all-star cast of then familiar named performers as Lew Ayres, Sally Eilers, Norman Foster (in a type of role that makes one think of Henry Fonda) and Louise Dresser (Rogers' frequent co-star) in support, this is one of those rare occasions where the legendary Will Rogers is not the center of attention, allowing other members of the cast to perform their individual scenes at length. While STATE FAIR rightfully belongs to the Academy Award winning Janet Gaynor, it's become noted by film historians solely as a Will Rogers movie.Opening title: "A State Fair is like life – begins hastily – offers everything – whether you go for sheep and blue ribbons – or shape and blue eyes, and too soon it's over." The story opens at a farm in Brunswick, Iowa, where the Frake family prepare themselves for their annual trip to the State Fair. Abel (Will Rogers) intends on placing his pig, Blue Boy, in a contest while Melissa (Louise Dresser), his wife, works on pickles and mincemeat for the upcoming food tasting competition. Other members of the family include their daughter, Margy (Janet Gaynor), engaged to a man she does not love, Harry Ware (Frank Melton), and son, Wayne (Norman Forster), having just been jilted by his girlfriend, Eleanor, practicing to perfect his hoop tossing method. Before driving off to their journey for a week at the fair, the neighborhood storekeeper (Frank Craven) wages Abel five dollars that the family will return home a week later in bitter disappointment. After camping on the State Fair grounds, Wayne gets even with a barker (Victor Jory) who made a fool of him the previous year cheating him out of his $8, soon to find romance with Emily Joyce (Sally Eilers), a trapeze artist who introduced herself to him as the sheriff's daughter. As for Margy, she encounters Pat Gilbert (Lew Ayres), a newspaper man for The Register, while riding on a high speed roller coaster, followed by both happiness and disappointments for the Frakes before returning home to the farm where the storekeeper awaits to hear the family's final verdict.While immensely popular at the time of its release, even to a point of being nominated for Academy Award as Best Picture, STATE FAIR has been eclipsed by the musicalized 1945 Technicolor remake by 20th Century-Fox featuring Jeanne Craine (Margy), Dana Andrews (Pat), Dick Haymes (Wayne), Charles Winniger (Abel) and Fay Bainter (Melissa), with excellent songs by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, including the Academy Award winning, "It Might as Well Be Spring." Though there's no such "Grand Night for Singing" involved here, the original STATE FAIR does contain its very own beautifully underscored theme song titled "Romantic." Interestingly, STATE FAIR was revamped and musicalized a second time by 20th Century-Fox (1962), the reason why the original title to the 1945 edition was changed to "It Happened One Summer" for television showings during the sixties and seventies before restored to its original title by the 1980s. With the new cast for 1962 headed by Pat Boone, Ann-Margret, Tom Ewell and Alice Faye, it was believed that this slice of Americana belonged to another era and out of place for the 1960s. Yet nothing comes close to Will Rogers' laid-back style and genuine humor for which he is famous.The first time I've ever heard of the existence of STATE FAIR was when mentioned on a game show, "The Movie Game" (1969-70) during a broadcast on New York City's WOR, Channel 9, where the panelists from that program were surprised to learn there was an ever a STATE FAIR movie starring Will Rogers prior to the better known 1945 musical. For one of the finest films for both Will Rogers and Janet Gaynor, STATE FAIR has been out of circulation for many years. A slow process of availability began sometime the 1970s when presented in revival movie houses, television stations as Hartford, Connecticut's WFSB-TV, Channel 3, around 1974-75; public television's WNET, Channel 13, New York City (1991-92); the Fox Movie Channel and finally Turner Classic Movies (TCM premiere" February 8, 2012). Never distributed to video cassette as some other Will Rogers movies during his Fox Film Studio period (1929-1935), distribution on DVD is long overdue for such a fine wholesome movie from a bygone era. (***1/2)

I never found a lot about the musical versions of this story which I liked. Now that I have found the original non-musical version,I don't understand why it has never been remade this way. Granted it has been a long time since 1933, but that doesn't take away from this story being done without music.This is an American farm family going to the State Fair. It is direct, it has funny moments, it has charm. Will Rodgers shows in this one why he was so popular in the public in films and writing wit.He gets second billing here to a young attractive Janet Gaynor. This movie shows her off very well. The relationships are more mature here than a few years later when the codes made films slip a little.Louise Dresser and Lew Ayres are along in a good supporting cast. What is special here is how much they get done in just over 90 minutes. There are a lot of good points, and a few rough spots that were not intended by the filmmaker but have to do with the films age.Gaynor, a top star at FOX when this was made is very lucky to be in a pre-code starring role. The camera is allowed to enhance her image on film here by showing her off in camera angles that were banned with a few years until Babs Streisand discovered those same angles later with her own films. Gaynor exhibits an adult charm.The romances are simply drawn but effective. This is a film worth a look and I warn you, once you watch this one, the musical versions later will not compare to this, the better original version.

State Fair is actually a pretty good movie that's mostly just a vehicle for Janet Gaynor. But it ends up being more than that with the help of Will Rogers and Lew Ayres.The story revolves around a farming family who enters a prize pig in the State Fair. The two children of the family go off on their own separate adventures while the two parents stay with the pig.Gaynor is one of the children and she meets and falls in love with Ayres. Their chemistry together is a very intriguing one. Will Rogers is the father who is mostly the comic relief. You'll most likely like the film and it deserves to be liked. Its a great gem from the early '30s that isn't seen much anymore.I was able to finally watch the film when it was on The Fox Movie Channel last year. It might be on again soon. I suggest you find out.