5
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) – Highly recommended – A classic musical comedy/farce
starring MM and Jane Russell as two showgirls who travel to Paris in pursuit of love and money, not necessarily in that order. This is MMs megastar coming out party. It’s very funny; perhaps her best comic performance (although some would nominate Some Like it Hot for that honor). Plus it has a great script and some good musical moments - featuring MM’s famous Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend number and the very campy Anyone Here for Love performed by Russell, strolling among a score of swimsuit clad male models. And there’s a very silly, funny scene in a French courtroom near the end. At the time, Russell was the bigger star, but this movie totally changed that. MM got a line inserted for her character, Lorelei Lee, that might just summarize her point of view on the dumb blonde routine. When her fiancée’s disapproving father (Charles Coburn again) expresses surprise that Lorelei is not the dimwit he thought she was, she replies, ”I can be smart when it’s important. But most men don’t like it.” Directed by Howard Hawks. Pretty frickin’ great.
(BTW, the 1925 comic novel Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos, on which the movie is based, is quite funny and also great! You may want to check that out as well.)
6
How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) – Not particularly recommended – This is okay, but nothing special. It’s something of a retread of the Gentlemen Prefer Blondes gold-digger concept. This time out, MM shares the spotlight with Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable, and MM comes in third. She shows her comic chops with a running gag about her being quite myopic. While the ladies do their best with a mediocre script, the movie has no sparkle. The story, about three attractive dames sharing a NY apartment seeking their fortunes through marriage, is dully predictable. The men involved include Rory Calhoun and William Powell.
7
River of No Return (1954) - Not particularly recommended – Starring MM and Robert Mitchum,
River of No Return is somewhere between a Western and a man against nature story. MM is a bar singer in the wild west during a gold-rush and is very luscious, even in jeans during a long interlude on a raft and camping by the riverside. She also speaks in a voice almost like a real person, not the breathy sex kitten voice used in most of her earlier vehicles. Mitchum shows up to reclaim the motherless son that MM has been caring for over the last several weeks. Mitchum is a stranger in town; long absent from his son’s life for reasons that eventually get explained. MM’s boyfriend (Rory Calhoun) is the villain. MM and Mitchum are always watchable, of course, but the picture is just okay, even though it is pretty to watch and illustrates something of a moral. If, however, you were ever a Tommy Rettig fan (he played the kid in the 1950s TV series “Lassie” and in the 1953 cult classic The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T.) you might want to see him in this.
8
The Seven Year Itch (1955) – Recommended (with reservations) – This very popular comedy was adapted
from a successful Broadway production in which a fretfully neurotic married man, alone in his city apartment while his wife and child spend the summer in Maine, fights the temptation to have an affair with his new upstairs neighbor. Tom Ewell played the guy, Richard Sherman, for over 900 performances on the Broadway boards and reprises the role in this movie. The girl upstairs is MM, who’s very friendly and quite used to garnering enthusiastic male appreciation. In truth, though, it’s a hot summer, so she’s mostly interested in Richard’s air conditioner. There are some funny bits to be sure, and MM once again shows herself to be quite the comedian (or comedienne, as they said in the fifties). This is the movie famous for MM standing over a subway grate enjoying the breeze as her skirt blows up around her shapely legs. (In the fifties, seeing a young lady’s thighs was something of a thrill.) I must admit that I was increasingly put-off by Richard’s non-stop monologue, narrating his every thought out loud; it may have worked on stage, but after a while, I found it a bit annoying in the film; and the 1950s sexist male fantasy, even as a satire, has not aged well. But taken as a comedic period piece, it's pretty classic.
9
Bus Stop (1956) – Recommended – MM can act. Really! The film is about a young, egotistical, remarkably naïve rodeo cowboy named Bo (Don Murray) who ‘s never been off his Montana ranch. Now he’s on the bus heading to Phoenix for the big rodeo there, expecting to win every event. On the way his companion-chaperone, Uncle Virgil (the great character actor Arthur O’Connell) suggests that it’s time for this 21-year-old whippersnapper to find himself a woman – a notion that rattles Bo, who admits that he “don’t know anything about gals; nothing at all.” Accepting his uncle’s suggestion, Bo vows that he’ll find himself an “angel”, lasso her like a calf and take her home. Once in Phoenix, he finds his “angel” in world-weary saloon singer Cherie (MM). She’s not at all keen about going off with this wacky lunk as some sort of trophy. And she knows she’s no angel. Even so, he gets her on the bus home against her will; but a forced stop at a roadside café during a blizzard forces Bo to find his humanity. The terrific screenplay by George Axelrod is adapted from William Inge’s Pulitzer prize winning stage play. Axelrod, who also wrote The Seven Year Itch, as well as Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961) and The Manchurian Candidate (1962), knew what he was doing. The Cherie role was a godsend for MM, who completely and beautifully inhabits her character. The sexy voice from her previous hit films is completely gone; in its place is a hard-bitten voice with a credible Ozark accent and attitude to match. The movie as a whole is both comic and melodramatic. As a plus, there are some fun rodeo scenes.
10
Some Like It Hot (1959) – Recommended – MM got top billing, but actually she’s got somewhat of a supporting role to Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon. MM plays Sugar Kane Kowalczyk, a sexy singer/ukelelist in a travelling all girl band – Sweet Sue’s Society Syncopaters. Curtis and Lemmon are a couple of musicians (they play sax and string bass respectively). They’re also the sole surviving witnesses to a Chicago mafia massacre and need to flee for their lives, pretending to be dames to join Sweet Sue’s band – on a train heading heading down to Florida. Joe (Curtis) becomes Josephine and Jack (Lemmon) becomes Daphne. Various cross-dressing hijinks ensue, complicated by the fact that both men develop a crush on Sugar Kane. She’s gullible in that charming MM way and Tony and Jack do quite well in drag. In fact, Lemmon’s Daphne character even attracts a gazillionaire admirer in Osgood Fielding III (the wonderful Joe E Brown) adding to the many complications. It’s all silly, madcap fun. Written and directed by Billy Wilder. The role of Sugar Kane may not be much of a stretch for MM, but she’s wonderful; and her male costars are fabulous. This is a bona fide classic. It doesn’t get my highest rating only because the dated gender attitudes occasionally rub against the comedy sixty years on.
11
The Misfits (1961) – Highly recommended – Starring Clark Gable, Eli Wallach, Montgomery Clift and Thelma Ritter. The screenplay was written for MM by her husband, playwright Arthur Miller, even though their marriage was largely on the rocks by that time. MM thought this was her best movie. It’s certainly her most interesting dramatic role. It was also her final completed film and likewise Gable’s last film – he died of a heart attack a few weeks after shooting was complete and a couple months before the film was released. The movie starts as a young woman, Roslyn (MM) is getting divorced in Renoo, accompanied by new friend Isabelle (Ritter). Roslyn is at a crossroads, not sure what to do with her life. When she and Isabelle meet aging cowboy Gay Langland (Gable) and his buddy Guido (Wallach), a taxi driver and renowned bush pilot, the men try to convince Roslyn to give Western ranch life a try – each hoping to hook up with her. Roslyn’s soul is stirred by the arid beauty and stillness of the Nevada outback, and when Isabelle supports the idea, she agrees to stay awhile. But times and attitudes have changed and the men – intent on rounding up wild mustangs for cash – are slow to realize that the old cowboy life is a thing of the past. This one holds up, and MM was right: she gives a pretty terrific performance. The great director John Huston (
The Maltese Falcon, Treasure of the Sierra Madre, The African Queen, Night of the Iguana, Prizzi’s Honor, etc] helmed this, MM’s last movie, as well as her first significant film,
The Asphalt Jungle, above.]
The first ten of the above films are available to rent at reasonable cost (under $4) on most streaming services (excepting Netflix). The Misfits is available free to Amazon Prime subscribers, and for rent on Vudu, Amazon, and some other services.
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