Most critics are won over, and they are won over by the same things. Gene Kelly’s dancing and choreography draw the warmest praise, with Leslie Caron close behind, and nearly every review singles out the Gershwin score and Minnelli’s Technicolor palette. The closing ballet, running the best part of twenty minutes, is the sequence most often named as the reason to watch. Reviews from 1951 and from decades later land in much the same place.
The reservations are nearly as consistent. The plot is called thin, the romance corny, and several critics say it has dated less gracefully than other MGM musicals of the period. The Guardian finds it sugary and theatrical, The AV Club calls its ambitions muddled and a little pretentious, and Time Out notes an uncomfortable age gap in the love triangle. Roger Ebert ranks it below Singin’ in the Rain. Nobody dislikes it; the spread runs from fond to dutiful.