Cover Girl (5 Stars)

Cover Girl (1944) often gets remembered as a glossy Rita Hayworth vehicle, but its real historical weight lies in what it did for Gene Kelly. More than any of his earlier screen appearances, the film announces Kelly as a major Hollywood star and, crucially, as a new kind of musical performer.

Before Cover Girl, Kelly had appeared in films like For Me and My Gal, but he was still feeling his way into cinema. He came from Broadway, where his athletic style and masculine energy already set him apart, yet Hollywood musicals were dominated by a lighter, more elegant tradition. In Cover Girl, Kelly finally finds material that allows him to fuse dance, character and storytelling into something coherent and modern.

The film is important because it positions Kelly as both romantic lead and creative force. As Rusty Parker's press agent and love interest, he is not simply there to support Hayworth's rise; he embodies a working-class, artistic ideal that contrasts with the artificial glamour of modelling and celebrity. Kelly dances not as an exhibitionist but as a man expressing frustration, joy and desire. This approach would become central to his later work.

The famous "Alter Ego" routine is the clearest statement of Kelly's significance. Dancing with his own reflection, Kelly literalises an internal conflict through choreography. It is witty, technically daring and psychologically expressive. No other male dancer in Hollywood at the time was doing anything quite like this. The sequence effectively declares that dance can visualise thought and emotion, not just decorate a song.

Cover Girl also marks Kelly's growing confidence behind the scenes. Although officially co-directed by Charles Vidor, Kelly had significant input into the choreography and conception of his numbers. You can already see the seeds of the integrated musical he would later perfect in On the Town, An American in Paris and Singing in the Rain. Dance is not a pause in the story; it is the story.

For Kelly's career, the film was transformative. It proved he could carry a major studio musical opposite one of Columbia's biggest stars. It also established his screen persona; athletic, earnest, romantic without being foppish. After Cover Girl, Kelly was no longer a promising Broadway import; he was a genuine film star and a creative visionary.

In that sense, Cover Girl is less about fashion magazines and show-business fantasy than it first appears. It is the moment Gene Kelly steps fully into his own, reshaping the Hollywood musical from the inside and setting the direction for the genre's golden age.