Cover Girl. 1944. USA. Directed by Charles Vidor. Screenplay by Virginia Van Upp, Marion Parsonnet, from a story by Erwin Gelsey. With Rita Hayworth, Gene Kelly, Phil Silvers, Otto Kruger, Eve Arden, Lee Bowman. 107 min.
Thrifty Columbia Pictures popped for Technicolor to highlight the charms of the studio's new star, Rita Hayworth, in this bright, swinging musical with songs by Jerome Kern and Ira Gershwin. Borrowed from MGM, Gene Kelly was given his first chance to choreograph his own material (working with his longtime partner Stanley Donen); highlights include the famous "alter ego" sequence, in which Kelly dances with his conscience -- a technical and artistic triumph that pointed the way toward his later experiments in dance for the camera. Hayworth plays Rusty Parker, a Brooklyn chorus girl whose victory in a magazine cover contest threatens to separate her from her nightclub-owner boyfriend (Kelly) and the close-knit world of working performers he represents.
The Technicolor photography by Rudolph Maté and Allen M. Davey gives Hayworth an almost otherworldly glamour while maintaining the warm, lived-in feel of the Brooklyn scenes.