Some Like It "What" ?

Rating: 8/10 (23 July 2008)

Ever since I first viewed this film in 1983, I found this this film funny but not as riotous as others found it to be. Now, 25 years later, I still find this film overrated. For years, I've been trying to figure out why. Now I'm attempting to articulate my feelings for this comedy, for it's another "classic" film which needs its merits re-examined. This film has a terrific comic premise, but it didn't need to be dragged out for two hours. Any film with a farcical tone risks losing sustaining power with a long running time. One other film which died under its own weight was the three-hour-plus "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World", whose success ultimately rested on its cast, a mixture of serious actors(Spencer Tracy, for one), good(Sid Caesar, Jonathan Winters, etc.)and mediocre comic actors(Ethel Merman anybody?). Then again, director Stanley Kramer isn't famous for his comic gifts. Now for the cast of "Some Like It Hot". No blame will be heaped upon Tony Curtis & Jack Lemmon, whose performances in & out of drag justifies the positive reputation of this film; in fact, this film screeches to halt whenever either of them is off-screen. As for Marilyn Monroe, I enjoyed her singing; otherwise, I found her miscast in this film. The role of Sugar Kane needed someone with an unquestionably stronger sense of self than Monroe was capable of projecting here. Her frequently reported unprofessional behavior off-screen is all too evident here within this film; sadly, it would be the beginning of the end for her career and her life. Nevertheless, her name meant big box office for the film, and it is forever preserved on this film; however, there is no accounting for taste in what the public finds sexy, then or now. As for the rest of the cast, the only other actors who showed comic timing were Joan Shawlee as Sweet Sue and Joe E. Brown as Lemmon's romantic partner Osgood Fielding. Too bad the same couldn't be said for either George Raft or Pat O'Brien. I'm sure neither of them were hired for being funny, yet it's too bad director Billy Wilder didn't allow either of them to deliver his dialog with a little tongue-in-cheek. But Raft & O'Brien stop the film in its tracks, and that is symptomatic of a film farce lacking in any sense of pacing. Any good film farce needs to move, but this one stagnates and lumbers about.