The Stork Club (1945)

A struggling singer (Betty Hutton) who works at the posh Stork Club in New York saves a drowning man (Barry Fitzgerald). He turns out to be a millionaire and in gratitude, he anonymously rewards her with a chic apartment, a fat bank account and charge accounts at expensive department stores. I doubt many people today even know what the Stork Club (a real nightclub) represented to 1940s movie audiences. It represented the epitome of swanky Manhattan social night life. So a movie built around the Stork Club would seem to have a built in appeal. The manic Hutton is an acquired taste (one I've never quite cultivated) but I'll take her frenzied manner over Fitzgerald's Irish pixie act which gets old very quickly. The film is a piece of lightweight fluff with some songs including two which became signature tunes for Hutton: Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief and I'm A Square In The Social Circle. It's the kind of movie that's as clear as the label on the can so you should know if it's something you want to invest your time in. Directed by Hal Walker. With Don DeFore, Robert Benchley, Iris Adrian, Andy Russell and Bill Goodwin.