Billy Wilder's Some Like It Hot is still among the greatest movie comedies, if not the greatest

Rating: 9/10 (19 August 2013)

I've only seen this movie once before on the late show when I lived in Jacksonville, FL, with my aunts. I remember thinking this was pretty funny. Now that I've watched this on DVD with my mom (who had never seen this before), it's even more funny than I remembered it. I mean, seeing Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon try to convincingly play women in order to escape some gangsters, especially in front of the actual females they're surrounded with, can be pretty funny since they don't really look anything similar to them but I guess the fact that many of them do drink might have been a factor. And then there's Marilyn Monroe, looking as luminous as one expects but also one of the most charismatic of actresses especially considering her off-screen troubles that seemed to affect everyone involved including director Billy Wilder. Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond's screenplay just cackles with such great lines. Oh, and I also loved Joe E. Brown's performance as the millionaire that falls for Lemmon's character. His seemed to be the best one here, even better than Lemmon's who was the only player to get an Oscar nomination. And while George Raft and Pat O'Brien played their typed roles of gangster and cop, they played them well enough to still deliver the goods. In summary, I'm not sure if I agree with the AFI listing this as No. 1 among great comedies, but Some Like It Hot is still one of the most entertaining of them, that's for sure!