Just about every Vincente Minnelli film is based on a novel or theatrical show, and he doesn’t have a writing credit on any of them. And yet, by project selection and the shaping of narratives through his direction, he managed to return to some central themes.
One of those is the tension between work and personal life. That makes sense for a man who was married four times and whose one true love was likely his art. That theme shows up early on in Meet Me in St. Louis, when Mr. Smith has the chance to advance his career by uprooting his family. It shows up in his films about Hollywood, which all detail the negative impact of moviemaking on private lives. Lust for Life does the same for a different sort of artist, Vincent Van Gogh.
The Cobweb is about the tangled affairs of the staff of a mental hospital, while Designing Woman chronicles the romantic clash between a sports reporter and a fashion designer.
Another popular Minnelli theme is societal conformity, an appropriate one for a man whose sexuality was questioned in part because of his fascination with costumes and set design. Both Home from the Hill and Tea and Sympathy concern young men ridiculed for their femininity. The titular heroine of Madame Bovary aspires to an upper class life but is hemmed in by society’s expectations of women.
Watching 33 movies over the course of a few months, I started noticing the Minnelli touch not just in the color scheme and intricate mise en scene, but in the way characters related to each other, the struggles they fought to overcome.
The 1948 musical The Pirate, in which today’s scene appears, is a bit of a lark, but even that film touches on some of these themes. Judy Garland plays a woman in a small Caribbean town who is infatuated with the legendary pirate Mack “The Black” Macoco but has been promised as a bride to the town’s mayor.
When a traveling theater troupe passes through town, the lead actor (Gene Kelly) falls in love with her and hypnotizes her in the hopes she’ll reveal she secretly loves him too. Instead, he learns of her Macoco obsession and ends up impersonating the pirate himself.
Black Macocco was the Pirate’s name
In his day, the tops was he
Round the Caribbean or Caribbean Sea
When he sites a clipper ship
Mack would board her and begin to clip
First he’d grab, the ladies fair
Especially those with jewels
Those with jewels to spare!
Especially those with jewels
Those with jewels to spare
Especially those with jewels
Especially those with jewels
Those with jewels to spare!
With his ladies and his loot
Next Macocco from the ship would scoot
Then he’d set the ship afire…what a pretty funeral
Funeral pyre!
Mack the Black, what a pretty funeral
Mack the Black, marvelous funeral pyre!
Though the years this black Macocco
Lead his pirate reign
His claim to fame was as black as his name
All around the Spanish Maine
When he’d a make his daily rounds
Gals would trail him like a pack of hounds
Ev’ry night he’d have a date Ladies go to pieces
Over Pieces of eight
Hey!
Sleep my baby, baby sleep
Time for babe to be in slumber deep
If you wake or cry or laugh
Mack the Black will whack ya
And he’ll whack ya in half!
Mack the black will really whack
Mack the black will whack ya!
Mack the black would really have to
Whack ya in half!
Mack the Black will really whack ya
Mack the Black will whack ya!
Mack the black will whack ya
And he’ll whack ya!
Aaaaaah! Mack was ruthless
Mack was feared
Perhaps it’s better that he disappeared
Yet I know, that he was bad
I could fall in love with
Fall in love with the lad!
Evening star, if you see Mack
Stop his wanderings and guide him back
I’ll be waiting, patiently
By the Caribbean or Caribbean Sea
Is that the Caribbean Sea?
And if I met this famous pirate
Met him face to face
You think I’d run and hide my head
And scream around the place
Why no I’d just sashay around
Displaying all my charms
And soon I’d have him walk the plank
Right into my arms
That’s what I think of Mack the Black Macocco!
Meet Me In Montauk 
It certainly makes sense that Minelli would gravitate towards certain themes of interest in his work.
I never heard of this one it’s seems to be a comedy 😊 I like saying the word Macocco