I gave it a '6' even though it is pretty dull. But you must accept these things for what they were at the time, with an audience probably being bowled over just by hearing any sound coming off the screen rather than from some tinkly piano being played in the movie theater. (Remember, this is a year before THE JAZZ SINGER.) If that is Rita Cansino (Hayworth), then it is surely her father dancing with her, but they're in such long shot that one really can't tell. She could just as easily be Mary Pickford! However, Anna Case had been with the Met Opera from 1909 to 1920, and had created the role of Sophie there in the American premiere of DER ROSENKAVALIER, and that of Feodor in the American premiere of BORIS GODUNOV, both in 1913. By the time this film was made, she had been a major concert star for a decade, and also had done a decent amount of recording for both the Edison and Columbia companies (her recordings are still available on CD). I can't see complaining about the lack of camera movement on this. We are talking about the antediluvian days of sound recording for film, and they surely had to keep the camera both boxed and totally stationary to capture the sound. They were still doing a lot of that in 1929/1930. Furthermore, despite one commenter's fixation on CARMEN, the music heard here is NOT from CARMEN, and the song Case sings is unidentifiable to me, and I know a lot about this kind of thing. What is most interesting for a film maven, I think, is that Anna Case gave up her concert career in 1931 upon marrying the very wealthy Clarence Mackay, thereby becoming the mother-in-law of Irving Berlin (one year her senior!), who had married Mackay's daughter Ellin despite some parental objections. Because they both lived long lives, when Case died at the age of 95 in 1984, she was still the step-mother of Ellen Mackay and still the mother-in-law of Irving Berlin, who died at 101 in 1989, a year after his wife's passing at 85.
