The Fabulous 50s

This is exactly the kind of sugarcoated, starry-eyed view of the 1950s one would expect from the producers at Reader's Digest (any film on the decade that spends more time on coonskin caps than the House Un-American Activities Committee isn't digging very deep). Cinema is reduced to James Dean and Marilyn Monroe, music to Elvis, and art gets no higher than the Golden Era of television. Directed by John C. Feld, the documentary relies entirely on primary sources--newsreels, television programs, commercials, film clips--with, admittedly, often entertaining results. Highlights include Nixon's “Checkers” speech, a public service announcement entitled “How to Spot a Communist,” and footage from the heavyweight championship fight between Rocky Marciano and Jersey Joe Walcott. In a decade where the gulf between surface perception and social reality was at its greatest, it's tough to feel that The Fabulous 50s offers much more than a superficial gloss on the Cold War or the birth of the Civil Rights Movement, while it's lack of voiceover or after-the-fact commentary will leave viewers with the impression that Sputnik and the introduction of Charles Schultz's Peanuts are of equal merit. Still, this is a fine collection of source material clips, and is recommended on that basis--preferably the DVD version, which includes bonus footage on the hula hoop craze, the Harlem Globetrotters, the UNIVAC computer launch, and the birth of the NFL on TV, among other clips. Aud: H, C, P. (D. Fienberg)