The movie is about two guys, Joe and Jerry. They are musicians, and they witness the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in Chicago. Spats, head of the Chicago mob, notices their presence, and tries to hunt them down so they cannot testify. Joe and Jerry decide to escape they will dress up in drag and leave town with a women's musical group. The group is going to Florida, where the rich old millionaires live, to perform at some sort of swanky resort. The two guys meet Sugar Kane, who is incredibly, breathtakingly beautiful. They both immediately are taken with her, and they compete with each other for her affection. Joe decides to disguise himself as...a man, and try to seduce Sugar. It goes well, but eventually the mob tracks them down. It's such a funny plot. There is something so satisfying about them for me, I always seem to fall for stupid farces and mix-ups.
Even though it's tame by today's standards, it didn't feel outdated. The jokes were really funny - and some of them were made more hilarious by some of the restraint, if that makes any sense. It was still pretty overt, but the comedy came from good dialogue and acting, not from just the sheer audacity of it. Comedy seems to age so well, for me. I don't know, I mean, I understand that all kinds of comedy don't work for everyone, but most of the comedies I've seen for this project have felt pretty timeless. Ah, I don't know. It just worked for me, and if you feel like you can relate to my taste at all, it's worth checking out.
Unlike Ebert's paragraphs explaining Marilyn Monroe's backless dresses, there isn't much more I can say! The plot was funny, the acting was outstanding, and I was laughing non-stop. It just hit the right chord with me tonight. It was sexy enough to feel modern but the smooth black and white cinematography and classic dialogue to make it feel unique. I have never seen any of the more recent "guys dress up as girls and do something naughty" movies, but that's because they looked so stupid. This one was fun without being dumb, and I loved all the over-the-top side characters and little plots. There's lots of little stories woven in and memorable supporting cast, like the randy bell hop who appears to be 14 and cannot stop flirting with the guys when they are in drag. The movie had a lot of depth and care put into it, which unfortunately can be uncommon now. I hope you take some time to find this movie and track it down, it's a lot of fun, I promise!
Have any of you see Some Like It Hot? Share your thoughts in the comments!
Links:
Ebert's Great Movie Essay on Some Like It Hot
Trailer
My mom loves this movie, but I don't. I taped it on TCM one time and watched it, and I remember being very bored and confused for the first few minutes to the extent that I almost turned it off.
ReplyDeleteThis movie is the greatest comedy ever made, and this is just ludicrous. I didn't laugh once during this whole movie. It was watchable and entertaining enough, but mainly just watchable. The ending is very good, but I didn't laugh at it.
I was shocked to see Roger Ebert's review talking about how it was all about sex. How could this movie ever be considered risque? If it came out now, it would be a G-rated children's film! It seemed like a 70's Disney movie.
I don't think it was appropriate for Ebert to dedicate most of his review to talking about how sexy Marilyn Monroe was, too, because this clearly was not a Marilyn Monroe movie. She just happened to be cast as the woman in this comedy, and she isn't even the main star. The two men are, Lemmon and Curtis. And I didn't think much of Marilyn Monroe, either. She was just boring, nothing special about her. Seems like the 50s were so starved for sex
But the only part of this film I actually disliked was how it treats women assaulting men as a normal thing that a man has to engage in when he is disguised as a woman. If a man hits a woman, he's an evil wife abuser, but when a woman hits a man, he must have deserved it, he shouldn't have been bothering her, a woman can do whatever she wants. Bullshit. A woman hits me, she's getting hit back. I don't take that crap.
But there wasn't much about this film that was bad. I just didn't really like it.
What I meant was "Seems like the 50s were so clean they took anything vaguely resembling risque and imagined it to be the sexiest, provocative thing in the world".
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