This movie is so earnest that I find it hard to dislike and yet... the feeling persists that Rodgers and Hammerstein were condescending to rural audiences with this one, a sort of "that will do for the sticks, now let's get on with our great stuff for the New York stage". After all, by the time they created State Fair, a) Rodgers had been composing top musicals - and b) Hammerstein came from a family in which top flight musical entertainment had been given - for decades.

It's tempting for a modern viewer to think "well, this is the way entertainment used to be: - yet in 1945, Rodgers and Hammerstein were writing in a city that was in the middle of a true golden era of theater - since the end of W.W.I., works by such American playwrights as Clifford Odets, Marc Blitzstein, Eugene O'Neill, Lawrence Stallings, George S. Kaufman, Sidney Kingsley, Moss Hart, Anita Loos, Maxwell Anderson, Elmer Rice, Marc Connelly, Sidney Howard, Dorothy Parker, Edna Ferber, had all been routinely on Broadway - and works by such as Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, William Inge and Edward Albee were all to be on Broadway within the next decade.

This movie is SO unimaginative and simple-minded that it's hard to believe Rodgers and Hammerstein gave it their full effort. Aside from the two memorable songs, the story does seem as if it could have been written as a joint project by an 8th grade.

All that said, I somehow enjoyed it!! The acting is fine. Dana Andrews is one of the most underrated actors - and the romance between his typically harder-boiled urban character and the breathlessness of beautiful Jeanne Crain seems very real - and affecting (if one allows the movie conceit of everyone falling in love and proposing within three days). This is due almost entirely to the actors' expressions because they aren't really given much by the writing.

The other romance (despite the very real musical talent on display) between Vivian Blaine and Dick Haymes (whose voice is a real pleasure to hear) just doesn't work - it's too underwritten and although I like both actors separately, they just don't seem as if they belong together on the screen.

I was struck at the pre-feminist view of the relative importance of the competitions entered by the husband and wife. For the husband's hog contest, a Congressman announces the contestants, the judges are grave and serious men, and the audience consists of complete families packing the stands. In the wife's pickles and pies contest, a newspaperman is teased for even being present, only women attend - and they do so standing (apparently there is no spectator interest) = and the judges are comical figures. Granted that there was/is more of a commmercial value to the raising of hogs in Iowa than there in a family's pickling and pie-baking - but the contrast in the significance the movie gives each contest is still noticeable to a 21st century viewer.

There are too few dramas -= and even fewer romances - set in rural America. I would actually like to see this one re-worked. If the characters could be made more singular, and the conflicts could be made more pressing, the movie would vastly improve.

**** SPOILERS ****

As just one example, what are we to think when Dick Haymes abandons his love interest from the farm within 5 minutes of arrival at the fair and proposes to THIS woman within three days - even though we aren't aware of any problem with his existing girlfriend - then we see them back together within an hour of arriving home?).

**** SPOILERS END ****

You may like this movie despite its poverty of imagination and the inanity of almost all the songs (e.g., the lyrics to "I Owe Ioway" make no sense) -if you do, it will be because of Andrews and Crain - their romance looks real and grabs you.

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JEANNE CRAIN (Margy Frake)

DANA ANDREWS (Pat Gilbert)

DICK HAYMES (Wayne Frake)

VIVIAN BLAINE (Emily Edwards)

CHARLES WINNINGER (Abel Frake)

FAY BAINTER (Melissa Frake)

DONALD MEEK (Hippenstahl)

FRANK MCHUGH (McGee)

PERCY KILBRIDE (Dave Miller)

HARRY MORGAN (Barker (as Henry Morgan)

JANE NIGH (Eleanor)

WILLIAM MARSHALL (Marty)

PHIL BROWN (Harry Ware)

Our State Fair is a Great State Fair
It Might As Well Be Spring
It's a Grand Night For Singing
That's For Me
Isn't it Kinda Fun?
I Owe Ioway