Ozzie Nelson & His Orchestra (1943)
*** (out of 4)
Another nice entry in Warner's "Melody Masters" series, which was used to show audiences current popular musicians. Ozzie Nelson is the performing this time and it's clear the studio is hoping to get young women interested as they open up the short focusing in on his rather good looks and we even get a couple attractive women in the crowd looking at one another as if they were commenting on his good looks. We get four songs performed (Come On Get Up, Chinatown My Chinatown, The Mammas with the Moolah and Central Avenue Shuffle) and Nelson does a very good job with each of them. In between the music we get a couple strange "performances" where Nelson appears in bed when a rather annoying women comes and tries to wake him up. This is followed by another sequence where Nelson is once again in bed but this time he's in the Army and his men are trying to wake him up. I'm really not sure what the point of these were as they add very little to the film but they are mildly charming in a goofball type of way. 'The Mammas and the Moola' is clearly the highlight of the short and comes off last as Nelson, in his uniform, sings the song is a comic manor and I must admit that it was rather strange but at the same time catchy.