Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra play baseball players who are vaudevillians in the off-season. However, if you watch "Take Me Out To The Ball Game", it looks like it's the other way around. In other words, they sing and dance practically all the time and only rarely do we see them playing ball. And, when they do sing, it's not about baseball! I really think this film would have been improved tremendously had it really been about baseball and if they eliminated a few songs in favor of injecting more plot into the movie.
The plot, scant as it is, often concerns Kelly and Sinatra chasing women--and vice-versa. While the romance between Kelly and Esther Williams was not very believable, I really liked the one between Sinatra and Betty Garrett. In particular, she was NOT a girl who played hard to get--and it was funny seeing her chasing (literally) her man! Additionally, there's another plot involving Kelly being manipulated by gamblers--though this seemed almost tacked on to the end of the film.
Overall, there are a few nice musical numbers and a nice romance--but not a lot more to this one. And, oddly, so many disparate plot elements (including a swimming number by Williams in a baseball film and some comedy numbers) that the film never really connected with me. Not a bad film but it should have been so much better.
The plot, scant as it is, often concerns Kelly and Sinatra chasing women--and vice-versa. While the romance between Kelly and Esther Williams was not very believable, I really liked the one between Sinatra and Betty Garrett. In particular, she was NOT a girl who played hard to get--and it was funny seeing her chasing (literally) her man! Additionally, there's another plot involving Kelly being manipulated by gamblers--though this seemed almost tacked on to the end of the film.
Overall, there are a few nice musical numbers and a nice romance--but not a lot more to this one. And, oddly, so many disparate plot elements (including a swimming number by Williams in a baseball film and some comedy numbers) that the film never really connected with me. Not a bad film but it should have been so much better.