The following listing (in multiple parts) was an attempt to compile a collection of many of the greatest song and dance moments in film history. Though the list appears to be dominated by musicals, other genres were examined and included.

Those that are exceptional examples of the development of song/dance are marked with this symbol:

AFI's 25 Greatest Movie Musicals of All Time are marked with an icon and their ranking number (#)

Another point of reference for this kind of material may be found in the AFI's selections of 100 Years...100 Songs and in this site's genre writeup of "Musical Films".

Wayne's World (1992)

West Side Story (1961)

#2

The tragic romance found in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet was adapted for the 1957 Broadway theatre stage, in the form of two New York (Manhattan) West Side gangs (the "American" Jets and their Puerto Rican rivals the Sharks), with a great score by conductor Leonard Bernstein and composer Stephen Sondheim, and staging/choreography by Jerome Robbins; the film version by co-directors Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins (for only a short time) was a multiple Oscar-winning film - and Best Picture, with some of the most famous and memorable ensemble song-and-dance numbers in film history; the film opened with a jaw-dropping aerial view of the city and then swooped down into the street for the opening song and dance sequence Jet Song ("When you're a Jet / You're a Jet all the way"); Richard Beymer (with singing voice by Jimmy Bryant) starred as Jet leader Tony, Natalie Wood (with singing voice by Marni Nixon) as Maria - the sister of the Shark leader Bernardo (Oscar-winning George Chakiris), and Oscar-winning Rita Moreno as Bernardo's girlfriend Anita; the most romantic of tunes expressing the love between the star-crossed lovers were Maria, Somewhere, Tonight (sung on a balcony) and One Hand, One Heart; Tony also sang the hopeful Something's Coming while Maria sang the ebullient I Feel Pretty ("I feel pretty! / Oh so pretty! / I feel pretty, and happy and gay!") in a dress shop; a "challenge" rooftop dance accompanied Anita's skirt-swinging America ("Puerto Rico, my heart's devotion / Let it sink back in the ocean... I like to be in America / Okay by me in America / Everything's free in America"), and the film ended with the choreographed gang fight that led to two murders and Maria singing Somewhere ("Hold my hand and I'll take you there") as she knelt by Tony's body.

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

White Christmas (1954)

Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

This landmark film that combined live action with animated characters featured the femme fatale character of sultry Toon Jessica Rabbit (Kathleen Turner, singing voice by Amy Irving) who sang the provocative Why Don't You Do Right? while wearing a shimmering pink dress at the Ink and Paint Club; it also contained the famous "piano duel" between Daffy and Donald Duck, Roger Rabbit's (voice of Charles Fleischer) looney song-and-dance while entertaining drunks in a bar, and Eddie Valiant's (Bob Hoskins) crazy vaudevillian song-and-dance (including the juggling of bowling balls) performed to a calliope to get the villainous Weasels to literally die laughing

Whoopee! (1930)

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971)

The character of Willy Wonka - derived from Roald Dahl's children's books, was adapted for the screen in this film by director Mel Stuart, with Gene Wilder starring as the title character; early in this cult classic was the first rendition of The Candy Man - sung by candy store owner Bill (Aubrey Woods): ("Who can take a sunrise? / Sprinkle it with dew / Cover it in chocolate / And a miracle or two / The Candy Man / The Candy Man can...") - Sammy Davis Jr.'s adaptation of the song became an all-time best selling hit; other memorable musical numbers included Grandpa Joe (Jack Albertson) and young, poor Charlie Bucket's (Peter Ostrum) triumphant and spritely song/dance I've Got a Golden Ticket, candy factory owner Willy Wonka's ode to his wondrous factory Pure Imagination, and the many moralistic songs sung by the orange, purple-haired Oompa Loompas: ("Oompa Loompa Doompa De Do/Dee / I've got a perfect puzzle for you - If you are wise you will listen to me"); the film also included Wonka's strange, foreboding song during the darkly morbid chocolate river-boat scene: ("There's no earthly way of knowing, Which direction we are going / There's no knowing where we're rowing, Or which way the river's flowing...").

The Wiz (1978)

This multi-million dollar, funked-up urban retelling of the MGM musical The Wizard of Oz (1939) by director Sidney Lumet (his first musical) and Universal Pictures, generally poorly received, was adapted from the long-running black Broadway stage version in 1975, with miscast pop stars 34 year old Diana Ross as Dorothy (a 24 year-old Bronx schoolteacher) and Michael Jackson as Scarecrow, singers Mabel King as the Wicked Witch of the West (now named Evillene) and Lena Horne as Glinda the Good Witch, comedians Nipsey Russell as the Tinman and Richard Pryor as the Wiz, and Ted Ross as the Cowardly Lion; filmed at the 1964 World's Fair grounds, the World Trade Center (which served as the Emerald City), and other locales in NY (Oz was a New York slum!), it was best known for the song Ease on Down the Road (sung by Jackson and Ross) and The Emerald City Ballet (with shifting colors commanded by the Wizard).

The Wizard of Oz (1939)

#3

One of the most famous MGM screen musicals, this one was adapted from L. Frank Baum's children's stories of the magical land of Oz - woven together with E.Y. ("Yip") Harburg-Harold Arlen songs; Victor Fleming was the film's major director, and Judy Garland took the role of Kansas farm girl Dorothy Gale - launching herself into stardom; this beloved and enchanting film featured Garland's iconic tremulous performance of the Oscar-winning Best Song Somewhere Over the Rainbow during the sepia-toned opening segment and the oft-repeated We're Off to See the Wizard down the Yellow Brick Road ("To Oz? To Oz! Weeeeee're off to the see the Wizard, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz!..."); other memorable songs included the Munchkin Medley when Dorothy first landed in Oz (with Dorothy's rhyming The House Began to Pitch, the celebratory Ding Dong! The Witch is Dead!, and the musical proclamations by the lead Munchkins: ("We represent the Lollipop Guild! The Lollipop Guild! The Lollipop Guild!")); throughout the film there were three variations of If I Only Had a... - the Scarecrow's (Ray Bolger) If I Only Had a Brain [truncated] which featured his famous loose-limbed dancing (inspired by Fred Stone's theatrical version of the character in the 1901 musical), the Tin Woodsman's (Jack Haley) If I Only Had a Heart, and the Cowardly Lion's (Bert Lahr) If I Only Had the Nerve (the Lion's Brooklyn accent pronounced it "da noive") - and later, the Lion's If I Were King of the Forest was hilariously-delivered; in addition, the welcoming song In the Merry Old Land of Oz ("Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho! And a couple of tra-la-las! That's how we laugh the day away / In the Merry Old Land of Oz!") was cheerfully performed.

Woodstock (1970)

Words and Music (1948)

This dramatic biographical MGM musical told about the disintegrating lives of Richard Rodgers (Tom Drake) and Lorenz Hart (Mickey Rooney); it starred June Allyson, Judy Garland, Lena Horne, Gene Kelly, Mel Tormé, Vera-Ellen, Dee Turnell and The Blackburn Twins starring as themselves; it featured the reuniting of Rooney and Garland (in their final film together) singing the duet I Wish I Were In Love Again, June Allyson's song Thou Swell with the Blackburn Twins, Torme's melancholy Blue Moon, Garland's powerful performance of Johnny One-Note, Ann Sothern's Where's That Rainbow?, purple-T-shirted Gene Kelly's jazzy barroom fantasy dance number Slaughter on Tenth Avenue with blonde Vera-Ellen (pictured), and Lena Horne's inimitably blazing and sultry The Lady is a Tramp (pictured).

Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)

#18

This well-known Warners' musical biopic (mostly fictionalized and presented as a collection of musicals within a musical) by director Michael Curtiz starred Oscar-winning James Cagney in his most famous role as bustling, jovial, and energetic song-and-dance man George M. Cohan, with his iconic, flag-waving, rousing and patriotic performances of many numbers, including his trademark strutting and wall-climbing as a 'Yankee Doodle Boy' during Yankee Doodle Boy ("I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy! / I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy / A Yankee Doodle, do or die / A real live nephew of my Uncle Sam / Born on the Fourth of July!"), his tap-dancing sequence in a spotlight in the large production number Give My Regards to Broadway, and his joining of a parade to march in step with troops and civilians down Pennsylvania Avenue to Over There in the stirring finale along with You're a Grand Old Flag; there was also the scene of Cohan and his wife Mary (Joan Leslie) singing the duet Mary at the piano together; one other memorable moment was his amazing, jaunty dance down the White House stairs after visiting with President Roosevelt (Jack Young) with a spontaneous, impromptu buck-wings tap dance midway.

Yellow Submarine (1968)

Director George Dunning's landmark, trippy animated film featured many colorful, inventive animations, especially the psychedelic count of numbers to demonstrate the length of a 60-second minute in When I'm 64, and the segment of the ultimate defeat of the invasive Blue Meanies by the Sgt. Pepper's Band with the song All You Need Is Love bringing the return of color to Pepperland; the live-action finale featured the actual Beatles singing the coda All Together Now.

You Were Never Lovelier (1942)

This Columbia Pictures film marked the second and last pairing of Fred Astaire (as American dancer/entertainer Robert Davis) and Rita Hayworth (as Maria Acuna, with singing voice by Nan Wynn - the cool but elegant second daughter of wealthy Argentinian nightclub owner Eduardo Acuna (Adolphe Menjou)); it was their follow-up film to You'll Never Get Rich (1941), and this time featured an Oscar-nominated Jerome Kern-Johnny Mercer score, including such standards-to-be as the Oscar-nominated Best Song Dearly Beloved (sung by both Astaire and Hayworth at different times) and I'm Old-Fashioned (sung by Hayworth and Astaire in the moonlit garden of her home before they danced), and Latin band music of Xavier Cugat; it included Astaire's song and their dance to the title song You Were Never Lovelier (pictured), their sensuous dance rendition of the romantic song I'm Old-Fashioned, and the exuberant "boogie-woogie" tune The Shorty George (pictured) with the sexy Hayworth as a bobbie-soxed swing dancer.

You'll Never Get Rich (1941)

This Columbia Pictures film was the first pairing of Fred Astaire (as New York musical theater choreographer Bob Curtis who was drafted into the Army) and "sex goddess" Rita Hayworth (as pretty showgirl Sheila Winthrop) in an entertaining war-time 'military' musical; it featured a Cole Porter score, one of which was the Oscar-nominated song Since I Kissed My Baby Goodbye (performed by Astaire in the Army's guardhouse) and the delightful and romantically-elegant So Near and Yet So Far (pictured) - danced by Astaire and Hayworth on a stage with fake palm trees; another of their dance duets was the tap-dancing Boogie Barcarolle led by Astaire as choreographer/teacher, and in the finale The Wedding Cake Walk (pictured), the two danced in their formal wedding clothes atop a white tank that was positioned above a giant wedding cake.

Young Frankenstein (1974)

The Ziegfeld Follies (1946)

This all-star MGM extravaganza revue by director Vincente Minnelli brought together many stars and memorable songs by George and Ira Gershwin in the Ziegfeld style (intended to be a follow-up to the Best Picture-winning The Great Ziegfeld (1937) and Ziegfeld Girl (1941)); the lavish opening number was Here's to the Girls - in which chorus girls (led by ballerina Cyd Charisse in a pink costume and Lucille Ball in her best-known film role as a caged big cat-tamer with a whip) were introduced by Fred Astaire (in his first color film); Astaire also performed two exquisite numbers with Lucille Bremer: This Heart of Mine in which he took the role of a jewel thief at a fancy dress ball with Bremer in a white gown, and later in the dazzling fantasy and fan-dance sequence titled Limehouse Blues with Astaire as an ill-fated and penniless Chinese coolie in a London slum and Bremer as a Chinese courtesan; and in their only screen duet, Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire (dressed alike) performed The Babbitt and the Bromide (pictured) - matching each other step for step; and Lena Horne performed the sexy number Love (pictured) against a Virgin Islands Caribbean backdrop.

Ziegfeld Girl (1941)