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Some Like It Hot (1959)

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261 comments in total

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109 out of 149 people found the following comment useful :-
Billy Wilder's screwball masterpiece with Curtis, Lemmon and the immortal Marilyn handed the best comedy roles of their careers., 18 April 2001

Author: gary brumburgh (gbrumburgh@aol.com)

Admittedly biased, "Some Like It Hot" can certainly stand on its own merit with or without my thunderous round of applause. More than a decade ago, I had the privilege of performing both the Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon roles in "Sugar," the musical adaptation of "Some Like It Hot" which originally starred Tony Roberts, Robert Morse and Elaine Joyce on Broadway in the 70s. Though it hardly compares to the film's original (how could it???), the musical nevertheless is still a big hit with live audiences. I can't remember ever having a better time on stage than I did with "Sugar," and it's all due to the irrepressible talents that instigated it all.

In the 1959 classic, Curtis and Lemmon play two ragtag musicians scraping to make ends meet in Prohibition-era Chicago during the dead of winter who accidentally eyewitness a major gangland rubout (aka the St. Valentine's Day Massacre). Barely escaping with their lives (their instruments aren't quite as lucky), our panicky twosome is forced to take it on the lam. Scared out of their shoes (sorry), the boys don heels and dresses after they connect with an all-girl orchestra tour headed for sunny Florida. Killing two birds with one stone, they figure why not go south for the winter while dodging the mob? Once they hit the coast, they'll ditch both the band and their humiliating outfits.

Enter a major detour in the form of luscious Marilyn Monroe as Sugar Kane, given one of the sexiest (yet innocent) entrances ever afforded a star. Snugly fit in flashy 'Jazz Age' threads, a blast from the locomotive's engine taunts her incredible hour-glass figure as she rushes to catch her train to Florida. The boys, stopped dead in their high-heeled tracks by this gorgeous vision, decide maybe the gig might not be so bad after all. As the totally unreliable but engagingly free-spirited vocalist/ukelele player for the band, Sugar gets instantly chummy with the "girls" when they cover for her after getting caught with a flask of booze. As things progress, complications naturally set in - playboy Curtis falls for Monroe but has his "Josephine" guise to contend with, while Lemmon's "Daphne" has to deal with the persistently amorous attentions of a handsy older millionaire.

What results is an uproarious Marx Brothers-like farce with mistaken identities, burlesque-styled antics, and a madcap chase finale, all under the exact supervision of director Billy Wilder, who also co-wrote the script. Lemmon and Curtis pull off the silly shenanigans with customary flair and are such a great team, you almost wish THEY ended up together! Curtis does a dead-on Cary Grant imitation while posing as a Shell Oil millionaire to impress Marilyn; Lemmon induces campy hilarity in his scenes with lecherous Joe E. Brown (who also gets to deliver the film's blue-ribbon closing line). As for the immortal Monroe, she is at her zenith here as the bubbly, vacuous, zowie-looking flapper looking for love in all the wrong places. Despite her gold-digging instincts, Monroe's Sugar is cozy, vulnerable and altogether loveable, getting a lot of mileage too out of her solo singing spots, which include the kinetic "Running Wild," the torchy "I'm Through With Love," and her classic "boop-boop-a-doop" signature song, "I Wanna Be Loved by You."

The film is dotted with fun, atmospheric characters. Pat O'Brien and George Raft both get to spoof their Warner Bros. stereotypes as cop vs. gangster, Joan Shawlee shows off a bit of her stinger as the by-the-rules bandleader Sweet Sue, Mike Mazurki overplays delightfully the archetypal dim-bulbed henchman, and, if I'm not mistaken, I think that's young Billy Gray of "Father Knows Best" fame (the role is not listed in the credits) playing a snappy, pint-sized bellhop who comes on strong with the "girls."

For those headscratchers who can't figure out why the so-called "mild" humor of "Some Like It Hot" is considered such a classic today, I can only presume that they have been brought up on, or excessively numbed by, the graphic, mindless toilet humor of present-day "comedies." There was a time when going for a laugh had subtlety and purity - it relied on wit, timing, inventiveness and suggestion - not shock or gross-out value. It's the difference between Sid Caesar and Andrew "Dice" Clay; between Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon and Chris Farley and David Spade; between "I Love Lucy" and "Married With Children"; between Lemmon's novel use of maracas in the hilarious "engagement" sequence, and Cameron Diaz's use of hair gel in a scene that ANYBODY could have made funny. Jack Lemmon could do more with a pair of maracas than most actors today could do with a whole roomful of props. While "Some Like It Hot" bristles with clever sexual innuendo, today's "insult" comedies are inundated with in-your-face sexual assault which, after awhile, gets quite tiresome -- lacking any kind of finesse and leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination. I still have hope...

Having ultimate faith in my fellow film devotees, THAT is why "Some Like It Hot" will (and should be) considered one of THE screwball classics of all time, and why most of today's attempts will (and should be) yesterday's news.

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78 out of 116 people found the following comment useful :-
The funniest movie ever made?, 9 July 1999

Author: Mike Salvati (mikesalvati@yahoo.com) from New Jersey, USA

One of the all time great screen comedies, Some Like It Hot stars Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, and Jack Lemmon at their best. Billy Wilder, one of the all time great directors, co-wrote and directed this fantastic movie.

Set in 1929, Lemmon and Curtis are out of work musicians who witness the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. Fleeing for their lives, they disguise themselves as female musicians in order to get to Florida and away from the mob. This is where the fun begins.

Renamed "Daphne" and "Josephine" they try their best to keep their secret. But when "Josephine"(Curtis) meets sexy ukulele player Sugar Kane (Marilyn Monroe) you know he's going to blow his cover somehow. While Curtis tries to woo Monroe by pretending to be her dream man as she has told him, Lemmon is courted by Osgood Fielding (Joe E. Brown). Curtis adapts a Cary Grant accent and pretends to be frigid in the movie's funniest scenes. Lemmon seems to forget he's a boy and has so much fun with Fielding and adores the things he buys him. Between the cases of mistaken and pretend identities, the mobsters come to Florida for their Opera Lovers Meeting. It all winds up with a hilarious ending.

This movie is a gem from start to finish. Curtis, Monroe, and Brown are great in their parts. Monroe brings a funny and sexy vulnerability to Sugar and Curtis is great with his performance as "Josephine" and the stuffy millionaire who talks just like Cary Grant. Lemmon really steals the movie here. He invests Daphne with such enthusiasm that we can understand why he's falling for Osgood. He's having way too much fun and it's great to watch him. This is a true classic from start to finish. It's recommended for anyone who likes to laugh.

Grade:A+

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51 out of 66 people found the following comment useful :-
What's Not To Like?, 15 November 2005

Author: ccthemovieman-1 from Lockport, NY, United States

Some people still say this is the greatest comedy ever made in Hollywood. Who am I to argue? Even after 45 years, it's still very funny and not the least bit dated. It is one of the true classics in the history of film.

I know one thing: Marilyn Monroe never looked hotter!

The film is a wonderful combination of comedy, action, suspense and romance with great old-time gangster scenes played out first in Chicago and then in Miami Beach. George Raft and Nehimiah Persoff are just great as gangsters.

The stars, though, are Monroe, Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis but you can also enjoy performances from famous known actors like Pat O'Brien and Joe E. Brown.

The action scenes are in the beginning and end. In the middle, the bulk of the film, is the main story featuring comedy and romance. Lemmon has the best lines in the film and his facial expressions alone evoke lots of laughter.

This film is so famous that there is no need going into detail, but for some younger person reading this, don't worry about this being an old-fashioned, boring black-and-white film your parents or grandparents liked but you would find boring. You'll have fun watching this, too, I guarantee it.

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27 out of 37 people found the following comment useful :-
The Perfect Comedy, 29 July 2006

Author: claudette-crivelli from Italy

Why a man would want to marry another man? asks Tony Curtis, Security! Jack Lemmon replays without missing a beat. Clearly he had put the question to himself before and had arrived to a perfectly sensible conclusion. Everything in this gem of a movie had been thought so cleverly and as it turned out so prophetically, that the world of our three characters, a world of prohibition and gang wars could be today and more than likely will be tomorrow. Billy Wilder analyzes human nature with an acid eye and a glorious panache for underlining our most endearing features. Our frailties. Marilyn Monroes is at her pick, the sadness in her eyes a startling metaphor in a comedy about wanting. Tony Curtis with an Eve Arden's pout is so beautiful, so charming, imitating Cary Grant and trying to be himself that, in my mind he'll be always be in a frock. And, of course, Jack Lemmon, throwing himself into the part, body and should. Only perfection can allow to end its course with a line like "Nobody's perfect"

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18 out of 22 people found the following comment useful :-
As Joe E. Brown famously said: "Nobody's perfect"... well I beg to differ. Some Like it Hot is just that little bit perfect - * * * * *, 27 October 2007

Author: SonicManipulation from United Kingdom

You would not really expect a comedy from 1959 to make you laugh, that is what makes Some Like It Hot the timeless classic that it is, times has never affected this, but it is sure as hell one of the best comedies of all time, it may be in black and white, it may be slightly clichéd, it may be a bit sexist, but who gives a rats ass about that? Some Like It Hot overcomes date and does for comedy like what Tony Curtis did for the movie industry, this is a fairground attraction of feel-good cinema with plenty of new comedy that took the genre to a whole new level, it cracks jokes that even modern audiences will love, if it were a modern comedy, it probably wouldn't work, first, Billy Wilder couldn't have been alive to make it, and second, we don't Have Tony Curtis or Jack Lemmon anymore, and three, we very unfortunately don't have Marilyn Monroe anymore.

Marilyn Monroe is the sex symbol of all time, I'm a 15 year old British red neck from the rough end of East Anglia, you would expect people like us to be infatuated with Angelina Jolie or Jordan, but I find Marilyn Monroe to be a super sexy female with many talents that she did not realise she had, she tragically ended her own life a few years after this classic and shes even more famous than she was when she was alive, Monroe added sugar to whole movie, so much they even named the character after it, she gives a whole new light to many movies she was in, even though she had some trouble getting along on set (She described her embraces with Tony Curtis as 'kissing Hitler' (the name she gave the bullying Wilder)), she always proved to be a great asset for the movie, she was branded many things during her career, things that people regret thinking her of, I first saw Some Like It Hot when I was very young, it was my favourite for quite some time then and it still makes my lists a very proud one, Monroe was one of the reasons it was so great when I first saw it and will always remain that way.

Tony Curtis was the heartthrob of the young century and you can see why, hes handsome, hes versatile, hes an overall, very talented individual, here he shares the screen with Monroe and Jack Lemmon, once you have a cast like that, there's nothing to expect but pure comedy, Curtis has always been in my eyes, the limelight of the movie industry during the early century, the first time I saw Tony Curtis's talent was in 'Houdini', a biographical movie about Harry Houdini, Curtis was in the title role and he did very well, when I watched Some Like It Hot I found he was very restrained, he made a very good impression of himself for a cross dressing comedy, but I can almost say that he looks good in a dress! Jack Lemmon was Oscar nominated for this and very rightly so, he must be the funniest person in the movie, and he gets all the best lines, Lemmon could not have done any better if he tried, the thing he does right is give his character comedy in his traits, he cross dresses and manages to make the audience explode in fits of laughter when he wants to, this is the highlight of Lemmons career and certainly his best work which adds very very much to this already brilliant film. A performance that he will always be remembered for and will always be the funniest thing about this classic comedy. Lemmon establishes himself among other comedians all over Hollywood, but the only difference is, he got there first, he does comedy the way Tarantino does samurai movies, once you see the great screen presence that is Lemmon up there on that screen, you have yourself in for a great ride, one that is too good for words, the audience is what gives Lemmon his power to act (as he said himself once), here the audience would give him as much power as Churchill, power that is much to well received to turn down, the sort of audience power that every actor wants.

The script is also terrific, written at such comic accuracy that you can not help how something that pure was written by a human being. The jokes cracked are those because of the superb script, fashioned to fit the actors and screen time, a hidden talent to be found in all the people who have anything to do with this triumph. Many other comedies in its time were mediocre compared to this, but in a way, its also very influential towards over comedies surrounding the time it was made, give it time, you will like it, give it even more time, you will love it.

I paid to see this movie and I will pay to see it again, a marvellous and brilliantly funny source comedy where the three performances dominate and the jokes are worthy of its name in just about every way possible, this is the movie that is impossible to dislike, no matter what kind of person you are, Some Like It Hot will definitely appeal to your good side.

* * * * * out of * * * * * 10.0/10.0

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49 out of 86 people found the following comment useful :-
Stands the test of time, 14 June 2000

Author: pegbo from Pittsburgh, PA

I just saw this movie for the first time and I'm kicking myself for waiting so long!! It's a rare film that makes me laugh out loud, but I definitely made some noise watching this one! Jack Lemmon gave one of the most hysterical performances I've ever seen; add Tony Curtis, Marilyn Monroe, and one hell of a script and you have the classic comedy that all others must try to live up to. I'd give this move a 15 if they'd let me.

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43 out of 75 people found the following comment useful :-
Awesome, it really is!, 17 April 2001
Author: Darth Sidious (darth_sidious@talk21.com) from England

Sit back and enjoy this comedy, I don't believe in greatest this and that when it comes to films, but boy, this is superb.

The acting here is fantastic, all actors, even Monroe are on top form.

The direction by Wilder is superb, the guy's style in this picture is perfect. He directed this film in a very clever way, by using one camera for the majority of the scenes, he could easily edit the film together without studio interference.

The script is well written. The dialogue between Lemmon and Curtis is beautifully balanced.

Monroe is just too hot for the screen in this picture. Although, Monroe had major off-screen problems (83 takes to get things right) she is fantastic on-screen. She may not have the best lines, but what the heck! She plays the role very well.

Overall, this is awesome, it really is.

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22 out of 37 people found the following comment useful :-
As hot as it gets, 20 April 1999
Author: Vlad B. from United States

A Comedy that has it all, and lacks absolutely nothing. "Nobody's perfect" may be an inherent truism, but "Some Like it Hot" is a definite somebody in the universe of cinema, thus it IS perfect in every sense. Swing, sex and slapstick, (three words that immediately come to mind when trying to describe it) , are a mix so delicious, so fruitful in its possibilities that one cannot imagine a film which can live up to them, and yet this one does. Marilyn, her trademark, displeasingly infantile voice aside, is a bombshell of thermonuclear dimensions, whose powers of titillation will not expire so long as there are hormones and/or Viagra. The sexual content, for socio-historical reasons cannot be as explicit as we've come to expect, but there's still plenty of it, from Monroe's see-through outfit to the double entendre worthy of the Farelli Brothers ("What do I do if it's an emergency ? - Pull the emergency break!" ), including overtly gay themes that have a cult following of their own. The Lemmon/Curtis duo operates with gleeful, unrestrained vitality that can only be likened to Chaplin in his heyday. Though not a Musical, the combustive energy of this movie is so stimulating it almost makes you get up and dance.

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8 out of 10 people found the following comment useful :-
A gender-bending comedy ahead of its time, 30 April 2004
Author: Nathan (psionicpoet@hotmail.com) from Troutdale, OR

What Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis do in "Some Like it Hot" would be par for the course in modern movies – every other month, similar fish-out-of-water movies premiere with men posing as women ("Tootsie"), women posing as men ("The Associate"), black people posing as white people ("White Chicks"), and on and on. What makes "Some Like it Hot" different is two things: the strength of its comedy, and the presence of Marilyn Monroe, then at the height of stardom.

Lemmon and Curtis turn in admirable performances both as Joe and Jerry, and as Josephine and Daphne. Tony Curtis does Lemmon one better by creating a third identity, "Junior", in order to woo Sugar Kane (Monroe).

Tying the pair's story into the Chicago Valentine's Day Massacre, where a gang war spilled over into a parking garage, leaving a number of people lined up against the wall and shot, is a deft touch (though the serious tone of these gang sequences contrasts sharply with the bulk of the movie).

The movie does an excellent job building the far-fetched stakes of the movie ever-higher, from their finding refuge from vengeful gangs in a women's jazz band, to their showdown in the Florida hotel, to the eventual revealing of Curtis' and Lemmon's identities. The movie's surprisingly suggestive and risque content is at odds with the time frame of the movie, and even with the period of the movie's creation. The many smart double-entendres and plays on words are very well-written, and alternate between lowbrow and highbrow comedy,

The films only fault might be a couple of overlong musical numbers, performed either by the whole band or soloed by Sugar Kane. Though to be expected in a Marilyn Monroe film, these musical acts are literal "show stoppers" that bring the comedic momentum of the film to a screeching halt. However, it is easy to over look these minor defects in the movie as a whole, because by and large it is quite funny – no wonder it s considered a classic – and after all, "nobody's perfect".

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18 out of 30 people found the following comment useful :-
A well timed comedy with a wonderful dialogue, 22 January 2001
Author: Svend Novrup (novrup@post4.tele.dk) from Kerteminde, Denmark

Some Like it Hot will have a Danish re-premiere on Marilyn Monroes 75th birthday June 1st 2001, and making the text for some advertising material in that connection I saw the movie again and liked it more than ever. Most comedies about men in womens' clothings have a vulgar humour. This is, of course, not the case for films like "Tootsie" and "Some Like it Hot" in which Billy Wilder using black and white instead of colours turns down the importance of the change of sex in many ways so that you can concentrate on the comedy which is extraordinarily well timed with a spiritual dialogue. The acting of Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, and Marilyn Monroe, not to mention Joe E Brown, Pat O'Brien and George Raft is out of this world, and of course it is possible to make a mafia war comical. Some scenes almost remind you of a Marx Brothers' movie. Like when a small berth in a train sleeping car in a few seconds is overcrowded with beautiful girls mixing Manhattan-drinks in their hot-water bottle while Jack Lemmon is desperately trying to remind himself that -- just then -- he is a girl, and Marilyn Monroe in seconds (with her back towards the camera!) produces perfect small, square ice-cubes out of a huge ice block. The music is enchanting like the Marilyn Monroe-songs which are all so well known.

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