Dannville, Connecticut at the turn of the century. Young Richard Miller lives in a middle-class neighborhood with his family. He is in love with the girl next door Muriel, but her father isn... Read allDannville, Connecticut at the turn of the century. Young Richard Miller lives in a middle-class neighborhood with his family. He is in love with the girl next door Muriel, but her father isn't too happy with their puppy love, since Richard always shares his revolutionary ideas wi... Read allDannville, Connecticut at the turn of the century. Young Richard Miller lives in a middle-class neighborhood with his family. He is in love with the girl next door Muriel, but her father isn't too happy with their puppy love, since Richard always shares his revolutionary ideas with her.
- Muriel McComber
- (as Gloria De Haven)
- Tommy Miller
- (as Butch Jenkins)
- Elsie Rand
- (as Ann Francis)
- Boy
- (uncredited)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaIs a musical remake of Ah Wilderness! (1935), based on the play by Eugene O'Neill. Mickey Rooney appears in both versions - as the younger brother, Tommy, in the original film, and as the older brother, Richard, in this movie.
- GoofsAt the beginning of the "Stanley Steamer" segment Richard Miller (Mickey Rooney) lights the burner in the steamer then gets in and drives away accompanied by several explosions from under the hood. A Stanley Steamer took several minutes to develop steam and could not be driven immediately, also there was nothing under the hood but a burner and a boiler neither of which would cause explosions of the type shown.
- Quotes
Richard Miller: Mankind was better off when we lived in the Dark Ages... when everybody went around naked!
Uncle Sid: Well, maybe so. But today it might interfere with your social life.
- ConnectionsFeatured in TCM Guest Programmer: Michael Feinstein (2015)
- SoundtracksOur Home Town
(uncredited)
Music by Harry Warren
Lyrics by Ralph Blane
Performed by Walter Huston, Mickey Rooney, Gloria DeHaven, Selena Royle (dubbed by Denny Wilson), Agnes Moorehead, Shirley Johns, Michael Kirby, Frank Morgan, Jackie 'Butch' Jenkins
[Sung by the primary cast in the opening scene montage]
There's a good cast. You can't find much fault with people like Selena Royle, Agnes Moorehead, Frank Morgan, etc. But for a big MGM musical, Summer Holiday is underpopulated with song-and-dance talent. Marilyn Maxwell and Gloria DeHaven are real singers. Rooney, in the lead, is not. Huston (who had a hit record of September Song), has a few good musical minutes, but at least one of his songs was cut. And anyway, you can't expect Walter Huston to carry the male singing chores in a screen musical.
Mickey did star in musicals before this. But he probably shouldn't have been expected to carry this kind of film. He was a huge talent, but as a musical lead, he was a different type, a showman (as he proved in the hit Broadway show, Sugar Babies, years later). He wasn't a song and dance man, like Donald O'Connor. You don't find yourself eagerly awaiting his next vocal or dance number.
As for his being too old, he is. But even when he was a lot younger, he just wasn't really the type to pull off this naive, bumptious character. He's a good actor, he tries, and he does well, overall. It's just that I didn't buy it and you probably won't, either.
The songs are good, but they don't have a lot of zing. They're pleasant. The numbers themselves are sometimes truncated. The cuts are rather obvious, at times.
The thing I enjoyed most was the recreation of various American paintings (like Grant Wood's American Gothic) in one sequence. It was both charming and satirical.
By the way, I don't know if anyone else noticed, but director Rouben Mamoulian chose to have the costumes and sets done almost entirely in whites, light grays, tans, and other soft, neutral tones. I'm guessing this was in order to contrast with the film's colorful Omar Kiam fantasy sequence.
But the sequence was cut, resulting in a colorless, drab-looking Technicolor film. Only the scene with Marilyn Maxwell, whose costume becomes more flamboyant the more drunk Mickey Rooney gets, remains as a contrast to all that colorlessness.
Mamoulian was clearly a man of talent, and his cast and technical crew were the finest the studio could provide, so it's a shame to report this film was less than the sum of its parts.
- jhkp
- Apr 30, 2018
- How long is Summer Holiday?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Ah, Wilderness!
- Filming locations
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $2,258,325 (estimated)
- Runtime1 hour 33 minutes
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
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![Agnes Moorehead, Mickey Rooney, Gloria DeHaven, Walter Huston, Jackie 'Butch' Jenkins, Marilyn Maxwell, and Frank Morgan in Summer Holiday (1948)](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYTk5M2MwMzctYTEwNC00N2VlLWIwNGQtMDJjMWI4ZTI3YzQ0XkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTY5Nzc4MDY@._V1_QL75_UX90_CR0,3,90,133_.jpg)