SOME LIKE IT HOT (1959)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Comedy

Director: Billy Wilder

Cast: Tony Curtis / Jack Lemmon / Marilyn Monroe

Plot

Having inadvertently witnessed the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, two down-and-out musicians go on the run from the Chicago mob by disguising themselves as women in an all-female jazz band.  Hijinks ensue when they both fall for the band’s voluptuous singer.

What I Liked

Were it not for the talents of its cast, “Some Like It Hot” would not be nearly as revered as it is today.  Or perhaps the praise belongs to casting director Phil Benjamin for assembling them and placing them in the perfect roles.  Tony Curtis is a natural as mischievous ladies’ man, Joe.  Lemmon in turn provides the perfect foil as the high-strung and exuberant Jerry.  Monroe does her thing about as well as she ever did it as the love-crazy bimbo Sugar.  Last but really not least, George Raft – who was a lifelong friend of Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky – gives an understated and underrated performance as the cold-hearted gangster Spats.

One of the other appeals for viewers back in the 1950s, particularly male audience members, would have been all the risqué subject matter, jokes, and shenanigans.  For a mainstream American film of its time, “Some Like It Hot” puts an abundance of female flesh on display, particularly legs and cleavage.  The best laughs in the movie come from watching Curtis and Lemmon get all kinds of curves shoved in their faces and not be able to react for fear of blowing their…ahem… cover.  And this twenty-first century viewer is not going to complain about two hours of watching Marilyn Monroe shimmy and swoon in a variety of barely-there outfits.

  

What I Didn’t Like

Criticizing a film that has been beloved by millions, is considered one of the defining moments of Marilyn Monroe’s career, and has been rated the single greatest comedy ever made by the American Film Institute might not be considered rational to some, but here goes anyway.

As I said at the beginning of the previous section, “Some Like It Hot” wouldn’t be nearly as respected of a film if it weren’t for the cast.  The plot and script itself are fair, but nothing spectacular.  The characters are about as stock as characters come.  The banter, clearly meant to be crux of the comedy between Curtis and Lemmon, often falls flat.  In short, I’ve seen this film more than once and on no occasion did it illicit more than a few chuckles from me in its entire two hour length.  Those chuckles came from the actors and how they delivered the dialogue or reacted to the situations in which their characters were placed, not from the script.

Here’s something else that bugs me about this and other old movies.  Outdoors in the Chicago winter the main characters are bundled up and constantly harping about how cold it is, yet we never once see their breath.  I know, nit-picking, but it’s just a pet peeve of mine to see something so simple overlooked in a major motion picture.

Most Memorable Scene

Tony Curtis gives us a terrific impression of Cary Grant when his character tries to woo Monroe by passing himself off as the heir to Shell Oil.  These scenes, all shared with Monroe, are the funniest of the film, particularly when they are together alone on a yacht and Curtis pretends that he is impervious to the wiles of women, convincing Monroe to use all of her curvaceous charms on him.  The actors have some enjoyable chemistry with one another, especially for two people who apparently couldn’t stand one another.  Monroe’s erratic behavior and lack of professionalism was a real trial for everyone else involved in the film.  By the time they got to film this scene, Curtis said later, kissing Monroe was “like kissing Hitler.”

My Rating: 4 out of 5