Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
Jerry Mulligan is an exuberant American expatriate in Paris trying to make a reputation as a painter. His friend Adam is a struggling concert pianist who's a long time associate of a famous French singer, Henri Baurel. A lonely society woman, Milo Roberts, takes Jerry under her wing and supports him, but is interested in more than his art.
An American in Paris is best remembered for its stunning Technicolor visuals and the extraordinary 17-minute ballet finale choreographed by Gene Kelly, which elevates the cinematography and visual artistry to genuinely exceptional levels. The plot is fairly conventional romantic-triangle stuff — serviceable but not particularly original — and the acting, while charming (Kelly's physicality is remarkable), doesn't quite reach the heights of the visual spectacle. The film was groundbreaking in its day for its ambitious integration of ballet into a Hollywood musical, giving it a modest novelty edge, though the romantic comedy scaffolding is formulaic. The ending, while visually spectacular in the ballet sequence, resolves in a fairly predictable romantic fashion.