by John Kander
Fred Ebb
Joe Masteroff I Am a Camera
by John Van Druten Goodbye to Berlin
by Christopher Isherwood
Starring:
Liza Minnelli
Michael York
Helmut Griem
Marisa Berenson
Joel Grey
Cinematography:
Geoffrey Unsworth
Editing:
David Bretherton
Music By:
Ralph Burns
Production Company:
ABC Pictures Corp.
Distributed By:
Allied Artists
Release Date:
February 13, 1972
Runtime:
124 minutes
Country:
United States
Language:
English
Budget:
$4.6 million
Box Office:
$42.8 million
Cabaret is a 1972 American musical period drama film directed by Bob Fosse from a screenplay by Jay Allen, based on the stage musical of the same name by John Kander, Fred Ebb, and Joe Masteroff, which in turn was based on the 1951 play I Am a Camera by John Van Druten and the 1939 novel Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood. It stars Liza Minnelli, Michael York, Helmut Griem, Marisa Berenson, and Joel Grey. Multiple numbers from the stage score were used for the film, which also featured three other songs by Kander and Ebb, including two written for the adaptation.
Why It Rocks
At the time of its release, the Hollywood movie musical genre was synonymous with family entertainment. This film reconceptualizes the genre and its conventions, resulting in a Hollywood musical with a European art house sensibility.
On the surface the film has some elements in common with most Hollywood movie musicals (i.e.: the central plot's a "boy-meets-girl" love story; Sally, "the girl", is seeking stardom; and the musical numbers -- in fact, all of them -- are performed within the film in front of an audience) However, what makes the film stand out, especially among recent Broadway to screen adaptations, is how the film defied and subverted the conventions of the Hollywood film musical in terms of its setting (Berlin, 1931, during the collapse of the Weimar Republic and rise of National Socialism), its treatment of adult subject matter and themes (Nazis, bisexuality, anti-Semitism, etc.), and the innovative, stylized direction of Bob Fosse.
Cabaret has some rather complicated origins, being based on a Broadway musical, that's based on a play, that's based on a novel. The 1966 Broadway musical in particular, was extremely successful. For the film adaptation, Fosse "wanted to make a brand new statement", and with Jay Allen having a weak first draft for his script, parts of it were rewritten. He relied heavily on original source material (John Van Druten's play and Isherwood's stories), with some major changes
Sally Bowles is American instead of British; Cliff Bradshaw, the American writer in the stage musical, renamed Brian Roberts in the film, is now British.
A subplot from the musical play about a romance between a landlady and a Jewish grocer were dropped, as were all the songs that didn't occur in the Kit Kat Klub ("Tomorrow Belongs to Me", remained in the film despite being sung in a biergarten, although Fosse later stated he regretted including the number)
New to the film version was a romance between a salesman (Fritz) and a wealthy Jewish heiress (Natalia), played by ex-model Marisa Berenson.
What may be the biggest change is the new character of Baron Maximilian von Heune, the center of a romantic triangle that turned writer Brian Roberts into a bisexual.
John Kander and Fred Ebb crafted a memorable soundtrack with 12 memorable songs or tunes (comprising about 38 minutes of the two-hour running film time) - all effusive, stylishly-choreographed, beautifully-costumed song-sequences.
The discarded songs were replaced with three new numbers, "Mein Herr", "Money Money", and "Maybe This Time", the last of which was inspired by a request from Fosse for something to fit Bowles' character after she falls in love.
In contrast to the musical play the film's based on, all but one of the songs are sung in the Kit Kat Club. The reason for the latter was that the director and producer agreed that characters bursting spontaneously into song would detract from the "reality" of the film's period setting, which used West Berlin locations. Thus Sally and the MC are the only characters who get to sing in the film adaptation.
Songs like "Willkommen," "Mein Herr," "Money, Money," "Cabaret," and "Tomorrow Belongs to Me" not only entertained but were mainly interior diagetic numbers - a radical reinvention for the musical genre. Cabaret was essentially a dark drama with the performance of cabaret-stage songs that were metaphorical to the film's story - yet confined to the stage.
Liza Minnelli's performance as Sally Bowles was the true key to the film's success, along with what and how she performed and her risqué routines, despite not having much acting technique.
The film had an authenticity that many other Hollywood movies about the war or pre-war years lacked, due to being shot in the Bavaria Studios outside Munich and on location in Berlin and Schleswig-Holstein, alongside several of the crew members (such as production designer Rolf Zehetbauer, being old enough to remember the Nazi era), and Bob Fosse including subtle references (“subliminal echoes”, as York calls them) to contemporary artists such as George Grosz
Nice attention to detail with for the costumes of the era.
The musical numbers performed by the Emcee revel in the decadence that serves as a metaphor for the political decline of the Weimar Republic, and the rise of the Nazi Party, which, in a few years’ time, would be closing down establishments like the Kit Kat Klub and burning "un-German books" in the streets of Berlin
The presence of the National Socialists increases over the course of the film, Particularly, in the one song performed outside of the Kit Kat Klub ("Tomorrow Belongs to Me"). It takes place in a country biergarten and is initially sung by Aryan youth with an angelic voice, who manages, through the course of the song, to whip most of the German clientele into a microcosm of national frenzy that becomes the perfect metaphor for the rise of the Nazi Party.
Bad Qualities
Since Fosse was addicted to-razzle-dazzle and didn't want to bore viewers, he tried to nail down every step and nuance of the film, and so some of the shooting angles for Minnelli's dancing can be a bit awkward. Her steps are broken down into pieces, shards, using a half-dozen or more takes and camera angles to assemble a routine. He filmed from within the cabaret audience, from behind the curtain looking out over the stage, from below and above, circling around Minnelli, filling the frame with her garishly made-up face, surrounding her with props and chorus dancers, isolating her in cold spotlights, cutting away to onlookers both aroused and bored.
The film's musical numbers are deliberately jarring and discontinuous, even at the expense of the performers. For example, the on-screen Minnelli is often out of synch with her soundtrack singing in her climactic number.
Fosse’s directorial style was forceful, even intrusive. He inserted quick shots of external violence in some of the songs, used brown-shirted Nazis to pump up melodrama, tried to illustrate Ebb’s lyrics with cutaway shots, and pitched some scenes at the point of hysteria.
*
