MILLION DOLLAR MERMAID

Esther Williams with Victor Mature

MILLION DOLLAR MERMAID (1952). Director: Mervyn LeRoy.

Despite having to wear braces on her legs as a child, Australian Annette Kellerman (Esther Williams) becomes a swimming champion, winning race after race, in her native land. After her father, Frederick (Walter Pidgeon of Forbidden Planet),  has to close up his music conservatory, the two of them head for London and better prospects, where a impresario named James Sullivan (Victor Mature of Samson and Delilah) hires Annette to swim the Thames to create publicity for his new acquisition, a boxing kangaroo. But Sullivan's grand plan to have Annette star in a water ballet at New York's famed Hippodrome, may hit a snag.

Walter Pidgeon, Williams, Victor Mature

Million Dollar Mermaid is the fictionalized story of the real Annette Kellermann (with two "n"s), who was actually arrested for indecent exposure at Boston's Revere beach and designed a more stylish one-piece bathing suit for women to wear. The movie invents some other stuff to create a little more drama, such as a love rival for Sullivan in the form of Hippodrome manager Alfred Harper (David Brian), arguments between Annette and James, and an accident on a film set -- Kellermann made several silent movies --  in which a tank in which she's swimming cracks apart and she's severely injured. The performances in this are all quite good from the leads down to the supporting cast. Even Jesse White is more likable than usual as Jame's friend and associate, Doc. Howard Freeman also scores as Mr. Aldrich, who wants to book Annette for a lecture circuit. George Wallace [Radar Men from the Moon] shows up briefly as a stunt pilot.

Don't lose your grip, honey! 

Hired to handle the water ballet production numbers for the film, Busby Berkeley, pulled out all the stops. There are men skiing down a slope while the ladies rush below them in a watery funnel; men and women diving off of swings high in the air and slicing smoothly into the huge pool beneath them; Esther rising up out of the water as she holds on to a ring and dancers do their kaleidoscopic thing far, far  down below her. George J. Folsey's cinematography is excellent throughout the film as well. At one point Annette, who'd planned on becoming a ballet dancer, gushes over Paylova (Maria Tallchief), but Williams' efforts to perform some kind of underwater ballet are relatively pitiful.

Verdict: Entertaining biopic with pleasing performers and that certain MGM gloss.***.