A musical movie about a young cantor who wants a commercial singing career, The Jazz Singer is an uneven film with a fantastic original soundtrack and an early 80s Neil Diamond.
My mother loved this movie. When I was a kid, sometime after it was released on VHS, my mom bought a copy of The Jazz Singer, and it played on repeat in the house. What I remember most is the music – at the time I knew every word – and with the recent release of Song Sung Blue, I realized that it’s been at least 30 years since I saw this film. It was time to revisit and see what I remembered as an adult.
The Jazz Singer is about Yussel Rabinovitch, a cantor in a generational line of five cantors, who sings at the local Orthodox temple. But Yussel, whose stage name is Jess Robin, has a different kind of song in his heart as well, and pursues a singing career with the help of some friends. His wife, Rivka, and father don’t understand what he could be looking for outside of his religious community, where he is loved and revered, but Jess takes off for LA to see if he can make it as a headliner. While there, he meets Molly, who helps him manage his career.
The details of the movie are very different from what I remembered, although all the flashes of memory that I had are there. For me, there is a huge nostalgia and heartwarming sensation attached to this film, but I’m going to do my best to be objective – which, honestly, The Jazz Singer made pretty easy for me.
Hands down, the best thing about this film is the music. With a combination of Hebrew songs and prayers, and a solid soundtrack of Neil Diamond rock, jazz, and blues songs, there are several pieces here that you know, and several that went on to be big hits. “America,” “Love On The Rocks,” and “Hello Again” were all written by Diamond (and cowriters) specifically for The Jazz Singer. In this day and age, the idea of that is incredible if we aren’t talking about a Disney film.
There are a few things that shocked me, though, starting with the scene of Diamond’s character on stage performing in black face with a group of black singers. These were his friends and he was filling in to help them sing, but it left me with an ick that any of them (or the director or producers or writer or…) thought that would be okay. So we’ll leave that where it is because yikes.
There is also so much hair in this movie. Poofs of hair on heads, mountainous hair on chests coming out of V-neck sweaters – just so much wild hair that it’s hilarious how dated it makes the film feel.
The storyline between Jess and his religious father and wife weighs heavily as you watch it. The expectation to be something specific when you know that you are destined for something different is something that most people can relate to in some way, but the rest of the film feels fairly awkward. It’s as if no one worked on smooth transitions from one thought to the next.
The Jazz Singer is not a great movie and it feels a little clunky, but between Laurence Olivier starring as his father (Laurence Olivier was in The Jazz Singer!?), Lucie Arnaz starring as Molly (yes, Lucy and Desi’s daughter), and an ultimate new meaning to the song “Hello Again,” plus the ear worms of the rest of them, this is a film worth watching. Or maybe just listening to.
Runtime: 111 minutes
Motion Picture Rating: PG
Languages Spoken In The Film: English
Should You Watch It? Yes, but mostly for the music
Did I Cry? Nope
My Rating: 2.75/5 Stars
Available: Free on Tubi and Roku, to rent on Prime Video, or may be available for free on other streaming platforms
My mother loved this movie. When I was a kid, sometime after it was released on VHS, my mom bought a copy of The Jazz Singer, and it played on repeat in the house. What I remember most is the music – at the time I knew every word – and with the recent release of Song Sung Blue, I realized that it’s been at least 30 years since I saw this film. It was time to revisit and see what I remembered as an adult.
