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Some Like it Hot (1939) features icons of American cinema at the peak
of their talent and has one of the funniest line deliveries ever recorded. Tony
Curtis and Jack Lemmon star as a pair of cross-dressing musicians on the run
from the mob while screen legend Marilyn Monroe is the love interest caught in
their web of lies. The shoot was apparently very difficult for Monroe, but the
end result, directed by Billy Wilders, is a comedy classic.
This is a very interesting
movie to revisit today. For one thing Marilyn Monroe is having a bit of a
moment with that new biopic out on Netflix. Then there’s the fact the two main male
characters spend a good part of the movie disguised as women, which was very controversial
back at the time and probably still ruffles some feathers today. There is also the
question of whether the movie’s jokes still work after over 60 decades. That
depends on the audience, but in 2009 I watched it as part of a film studies
course in Vancouver and the class laughed all the way to the final line.
A plot point that could
draw history buffs to the movie is the use of the infamous Saint Valentine’s
Day Massacre that took place in Prohibition-era Chicago. The two protagonists, down
on their luck musicians Joe (Tony Curtis) and Jerry (Jack Lemmon), witness a
version of this event and promptly decide to leave the city by any means
necessary. Fortunately, their agent has told them of a band in need of
musicians that has a show scheduled all the way in Miami. Unfortunately, this
is an all-female band. That doesn’t stop Joe and Jerry whose solution is to put
on some dresses and join the band as Josephine and Daphne.
It’s a good thing the
movie is in black and white because had it been in colour it would have been
even more obvious that Joe and Jerry are two men wearing dresses. Even they
don’t seem too convinced by their disguises. When Jerry says he thinks everyone
is looking at him Joe angrily replies “With those legs? Are you kidding?”
Things get even more
complicated when before boarding the train to Florida, the two are
thunderstruck by the sight of the band’s vocalist and ukulele player Sugar Kane
(Marilyn Monroe). Joe, the lady’s man of the two, immediately wants to pursue
her. That would of course break his cover, so his solution is to assume yet
another identity, that of wealthy heir to the Shell Oil corporation. Meanwhile,
Jerry, as Daphne, is being romantically pursued by the clueless Osgood Fielding
(Joe E. Brown), an actual millionaire who thinks he/she is the most beautiful woman
in the world.
The scenes between Joe
and Sugar are funny in their way, but a bit disturbing given the level of deception
Joe is employing. I remember the audience being a bit disappointed Sugar did
not have more of a reaction when she eventually realizes the truth. The
relationship between Jerry and Osgood on the other hand is flawlessly funny
despite being unbelievable. The millionaire is so smitten with “Daphne” that he
proposes to “her”, and the flattered Jerry, much to Joe’s surprise, actually
accepts.
Should this movie be
remade today I imagine a great many changes would be made to the script. For
one thing I would hope Monroe’s character would be less objectified and harder
to fool. However, one thing that can’t be changed is the Daphne/Osgood
relationship which gives us the great closing line “Nobody’s perfect.” Given
the context of the delivery, I challenge anyone not to laugh.
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