One of my favorite films of all-time is Singin' In The Rain, that's just a perfect cinematic musical if I ever saw one. Sunset Blvd. doesn't share much in the way of thematic content with that Gene Kelly motion picture, but both features do focus on one interesting facet; the way the transition from silent movies to motion pictures with sound affected the actors working in Hollywood. Whereas Singin' In The Rain took place right as sound was introduced into the world of cinema, Sunset Blvd. has a plot set decades later (presumably in 1950, the year the movie was released) where a legendary silent movie actress named Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) lives in the shambles of a failed career.
