This film reminds me of the odd song "Perhaps Love" which inexplicably paired John Denver with Placido Domingo the opera singer! Yes, "The Cuban Love Song" features an on-screen pairing that just defies common sense--with the classically trained opera singer, Lawrence Tibbett, playing opposite his on-screen pal, Jimmy Durante!! And, to make things even more bizarre, the love interest was the Mexican bombshell, Lupe Valez!! Talk about a strange melange of actors!The film casts Tibbett as a singing Marine, Terry. While I am sure Tibbett was a lovely person in real life, he sure didn't look like a Marine...more like a society boy with his cute little mustache and prep school manners. I honestly think Hollywood just didn't know what to do with the guy...all they knew was that he had a great voice. Heck, in another film they paired him with Laurel & Hardy, though the film, "The Rogue Song", has been lost. These odd pairings might help explain why Tibbett only appeared in six films and soon returned to the opera stage...only returning for a few television appearances later in life. As for the film, it's mostly an excuse to hear Tibbett as well as Valez sing...and their voices don't exactly complement each other. Tibbet's voice, even with the primitive sound used in this film, is incredible...and Valez's lacks the power and style of his. They are mismatched when it comes to singing...and their falling in love is equally strange and mismatched. Worth seeing mostly because of its curiosity value. Fortunately, if you need to see it, the print on YouTube is amazingly crisp. Too bad there are no subtitles, however, as sometimes it would have helped in understanding Valez.

This is not a particularly enjoyable movie, and that is strange.It tells the story of an American serviceman, Lawrence Tibbett, who gets shore leave in Cuba in 1914 and becomes involved with - I won't say falls in love with - a lively Cuban peanut seller. They spend some fun time together - and, as we learn later, conceive a child - before Tibbett is called back to the U.S. to serve in World War I.Ten years later, by then a married man in the States, Tibbett hears a Cuban song and sets off for Cuba again, in search of the peanut vendor. He discovers that she has died, but also discovers the child he fathered with her. He takes the child back to the U.S. with him and his wife, in the closing scene, agrees to take him back with the boy.In 1931, when this movie was made, this would have been a story about interracial sex - perhaps love. Tibbett's American wife, like Kate Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly, agrees to take the child of her husband with a woman of a different race. There is no chance for a marriage for the Cuban woman and the American man - he shies away when she proposes it - because of what was seen as the racial barrier. He has no problems having a good time with her, but marriage is another issue.Still, he can't forget her. Whether that is just sexual desire, or whether there is also an element of love in there, the movie never makes clear.As a result, Tibbett's character comes off as somewhat exploitative, and therefore unappealing, at least for modern viewers.I guess this could have been a male fantasy back in 1931, but today that is hard to swallow.I will say, though, that Tibbett's singing in his few numbers is very impressive. His recordings, while good, do not capture the sound of his rich voice the way this movie sound track did. He is also a very natural actor, unlike some other operatic singers who tried Hollywood in the 1930s.This is not a good movie, but it is an interesting example of how pre-Code Hollywood treated certain racial issues.

Lawrence Tibbett had a varied and distinguished career at the Met. In "Metropolitan," he got to sing operatic arias. The music here is schmaltz, though he delivers it with great beauty.He strides around the sound stage as if on a theatrical stage -- but that's not a problem. The movie itself is fairly silly.Jimmy Durante is somewhat restrained as his military buddy. And, lucky guy! He has romances with two lovely ladies. Karen Morley is the kind woman back home. And that famous Cuban Lupe Velez is the peanut-seller he meets while in the service.Velez is allowed little of the fieriness and tantrums that marked her "Mexican Spitfire" series and most other movies I've seen her in. She appealing.I won't give anything away. (It's far from a work of art or a suspenseful movie, anyway.) However, the plot does seem a Hollywood riff on "Madame Butterfly."

The Cuban Love Song is an early talkie with soaring tunes and a touching performance by Lupe Velez, who struggles, mightily, however, to sing the Herbert Stothart music. Most of the vocal duties are carried by Tibbett, whose excellent voice makes up for somewhat wooden acting that was unfortunately typical of the era. As a plot, the film depends on the old Madame Butterfly story (also used in Miss Saigon) of a military man stationed in the developing world (in this case, Cuba) who falls in love with, then loses, a local girl. Viewed today, the story seems tainted with racism, and Velez does occasionally overdo the cuchi-cuchi stuff. But the scene where Tibbett is called away to fight in WWI, and the Velez character tries to put up a bold front, has true emotional impact. Incidentally, the score contains "The Peanut Song," sung in Spanish, later used as a rousing number in the Judy Garland version of "A Star is Born."