The best Fred Astaire’s romance movies

Fred Astaire

Fred Astaire

10/05/1899- 22/06/1987
If you love cinema, you will share this ranking of the best Fred Astaire’s movies, although you may have ordered them differently. In any case, we hope you love it and with a little luck discovering a movie that you still don’t know about Fred Astaire.
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Top Hat

Top Hat
7.7/10
Showman Jerry Travers is working for producer Horace Hardwick in London. Jerry demonstrates his new dance steps late one night in Horace's hotel room, much to the annoyance of sleeping Dale Tremont below. She goes upstairs to complain and the two are immediately attracted to each other. Complications arise when Dale mistakes Jerry for Horace.

Easter Parade

Easter Parade
7.3/10
  • Genre: MusicRomance
  • Release: 08/07/1948
  • Character: Don Hewes
On the day before Easter in 1911, Don Hewes is crushed when his dancing partner (and object of affection) Nadine Hale refuses to start a new contract with him. To prove Nadine's not important to him, Don acquires innocent new protegee Hannah Brown, vowing to make her a star in time for next year's Easter parade.

Funny Face

Funny Face
7/10
A shy Greenwich Village book clerk is discovered by a fashion photographer and whisked off to Paris where she becomes a reluctant model.

On the Beach

On the Beach
7.1/10
In 1964, atomic war wipes out humanity in the northern hemisphere; one American submarine finds temporary safe haven in Australia, where life-as-usual covers growing despair. In denial about the loss of his wife and children in the holocaust, American Captain Towers meets careworn but gorgeous Moira Davidson, who begins to fall for him. The sub returns after reconnaissance a month (or less) before the end; will Towers and Moira find comfort with each other?

Holiday Inn

Holiday Inn
7.3/10
Lovely Linda Mason has crooner Jim Hardy head over heels, but suave stepper Ted Hanover wants her for his new dance partner after femme fatale Lila Dixon gives him the brush. Jim's supper club—Holiday Inn—is the setting for the chase by Hanover and manager Danny Reed. The music's the thing.

Swing Time

Swing Time
7.5/10
Lucky is tricked into missing his own wedding again and has to make $25,000 so her father allows him to marry Margaret. He and business partner Pop go to New York where they run into dancing instructor Penny. She and Lucky form a successful dance partnership, but romance is blighted by his old attachment to Margaret and hers for Ricky Romero.

Broadway Melody of 1940

Broadway Melody of 1940
7.3/10
  • Genre: MusicRomance
  • Release: 09/02/1940
  • Character: Johnny Brett
Johnny Brett and King Shaw are an unsuccessful dance team in New York. A producer discovers Brett as the new partner for Clare Bennett, but Brett, who thinks he is one of the people they lent money to, gives him the name of his partner.

A Damsel in Distress

A Damsel in Distress
6.8/10
  • Genre: ComedyRomance
  • Release: 19/11/1937
  • Character: Jerry Halliday
Lady Alyce Marshmorton must marry soon, and the staff of Tottney Castle have laid bets on who she'll choose, with young Albert wagering on 'Mr. X'. After Alyce goes to London to meet a beau she is restricted to the castle to curb her scandalous behavior. Albert then summons Jerry to Alyce's aid in order to 'protect his investment'.

The Band Wagon

The Band Wagon
7.4/10
A Broadway artiste turns a faded film star's comeback vehicle into an artsy flop.

Silk Stockings

Silk Stockings
6.8/10
After three bumbling Soviet agents fail in their mission to retrieve a straying Soviet composer from Paris, the beautiful, ultra-serious Ninotchka is sent to complete their mission and to retrieve them. She starts out condemning the decadent West, but gradually falls under its spell—with the help of an American movie producer.

Dancing Lady

Dancing Lady
6.8/10
Janie lives to dance and will dance anywhere, even stripping in a burlesque house. Tod Newton, the rich playboy, discovers her there and helps her get a job in a real Broadway musical being directed by Patch. Tod thinks he can get what he wants from Janie, Patch thinks Janie is using her charms rather than talent to get to the top, and Janie thinks Patch is the greatest. Steve, the stage manager, has the Three Stooges helping him manage all the show girls. Fred Astaire and Nelson Eddy make appearances as famous Broadway personalities.

Roberta

Roberta
7/10
Football player John Kent tags along as Huck Haines and the Wabash Indianians travel to an engagement in Paris, only to lose it immediately. John and company visit his aunt, owner of a posh fashion house run by her assistant, Stephanie. There they meet the singer Scharwenka (alias Huck's old friend Lizzie), who gets the band a job. Meanwhile, Madame Roberta passes away and leaves the business to John and he goes into partnership with Stephanie.

Carefree

Carefree
7/10
Dr. Tony Flagg's friend Steven has problems in the relationship with his fiancée Amanda, so he persuades her to visit Tony. After some minor misunderstandings, she falls in love with him. When he tries to use hypnosis to strengthen her feelings for Steven, things get complicated.

Daddy Long Legs

Daddy Long Legs
6.7/10
Wealthy American, Jervis Pendleton has a chance encounter at a French orphanage with a cheerful 18-year-old residen, and anonymously pays for her education at a New England college. She writes letters to her mysterious benefactor regularly, but he never writes back. Several years later, he visits her at school, while still concealing his identity, and—despite their large age difference—they soon fall in love.

Shall We Dance

Shall We Dance
7.4/10
Ballet star Petrov arranges to cross the Atlantic aboard the same ship as the dancer and musical star he's fallen for but barely knows. By the time the ocean liner reaches New York, a little white lie has churned through the rumour mill and turned into a hot gossip item—that the two celebrities are secretly married.

The Gay Divorcee

The Gay Divorcee
7.4/10
Seeking a divorce from her absentee husband, Mimi Glossop travels to an English seaside resort. There she falls in love with dancer Guy Holden, whom she later mistakes for the corespondent her lawyer hired.

Royal Wedding

Royal Wedding
6.7/10
Tom and Ellen are asked to perform as a dance team in England at the time of Princess Elizabeth's wedding. As brother and sister, each develops a British love interest, Ellen with Lord John Brindale and Tom with dancer Anne Ashmond.

You Were Never Lovelier

You Were Never Lovelier
7.2/10
  • Genre: ComedyRomance
  • Release: 19/11/1942
  • Character: Robert 'Bob' Davis
An Argentine heiress thinks a penniless American dancer is her secret admirer.

The Notorious Landlady

The Notorious Landlady
6.7/10
An American junior diplomat in London rents a house from, and falls in love with, a woman suspected of murder.

Finian's Rainbow

Finian's Rainbow
6.1/10
Having left Ireland, Finian McLonergan and his daughter Sharon arrive in the American state of Missitucky with a magical golden crock that has been stolen from Og, a leprechaun. Finian buries the crock near Fort Knox believing that it will grow bigger, and he and Sharon settle down in Rainbow Valley, a small community of racially-integrated sharecroppers. Meanwhile, Rawkins, a racist Senator, is determined to get his hands on the land but is thwarted when he is magically turned black and gets a helping of his own bigotry. After many plot twists, all is resolved and love, wealth and happiness descend on Rainbow Valley.

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