Change: it can work for you or against you, as these two films, which together heralded the rebirth of the musical in the early fifties, exuberantly demonstrate. The fifties' self-consciousness about being a locus where traditions meet swift social transformations is best expressed in Singin' in the Rain's choice of a sister era, the late twenties, when a single technological achievement, the advent of sound, threatened the artistic careers of a generation of film stars. Gene Kelly is brilliant as the silent star Don Lockwood, who connives to pull his pathetic partner Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen) into the world of sound by sidestepping the talkies altogether and inventing the musical, where Kathy Seldon (Debbie Reynolds) can do the singing offscreen. This vastly entertaining film has many layers of reality, but like the proverbial onion it has no center: its business is exposing the conventions of the cinema, where even “real” characters--the Don Lockwoods and Kathy Seldens--are not real. Frolicsome, almost childish on its surface, its complexities of structure and choreography mark Singin' in the Rain as a great leap forward in dance musicals.