The New Pictures, Sep. 20, 1943

(3 of 3)

The Sky's the Limit (RKO-Radio) whips Fred Astaire, Joan Leslie and Robert Benchley together with some other promising ingredients, then collapses into equal parts of mild pleasure and disappointment. Most cinemusicals are so large, loud and splendid that seeing one is like trying to eat a wedding cake singlehanded. The Sky's the Limit is rather short (89 minutes), rather unspectacular (there are no chorus numbers), rather quiet (three suave tunes).

In most cinemusicals the romantic protagonists cut each other's throats more shamelessly than they would dare to do in the most Borgian drama about man's inhumanity to man. In The Sky's the Limit a modest Flying Tiger (Fred Astaire) on hurried leave, a torpid picture-magazine publisher (Robert Benchley) and a photogenic photographer (Joan Leslie) work out their triangular difficulties with such decent respect for each other that they might be mistaken, in cloudy weather, for very nice human beings. The Sky's the Limit should have been a shattering innovation. Instead, it will do nicely enough until Fred Astaire makes another picture.

One of the best dancers since Nijinsky, Fred Astaire should have had more dances to do. In The Sky's the Limit he has only three, none of which suggests the fact, nimbly demonstrated in shows like Top Hat, that Astaire's dancing at its best can be a pure, heart-lifting delight. His latest partner, Joan Leslie, imparts the double impression in their dance numbers that she is hanging onto his thumb and that she is doing remarkably well in view of the fact that she is not Fred Astaire. At less strenuous moments Cinemactress Leslie is so nice to look at that her feet are the last thing anybody is likely to notice.