Written as part of the weekly blogathon hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves. Join in the fun by picking three movies that fit the week's theme and writing a bit about them!
So, the last time we talked Romantic Comedies on Thursday Movie Picks, I picked three terrible movies that, for whatever absurd reason, I love anyway. I know I can't possibly top that, so I'm gonna play it a bit safer this time around and just pick three of the All-Time Best.
The Philadelphia Story (George Cukor, 1940) Socialite divorcée Tracy Lord (the unbeatable Katharine Hepburn) is getting married again! But, sadly for her poor husband-to-be George Kittredge, not only is her lush of a former husband, C.K. Dexter Haven (Cary Grant) back, but he has brought with him an incognito reporter and photographer from Spy Magazine. As the wedding approaches, Tracy finds herself still nursing an attraction to Dexter, and finds a growing affection for the journalist Mike Connor (Jimmy Stewart). What a dilemma! Adapted from the stage play by Philip Barry, the dialogue sparkles, and the three stars form an irresistible love triangle through their considerable chemistry with each other (although originally, it was meant to be Clark Gable as Dexter and Spencer Tracy as Mike, which would have been just as delicious). Hepburn originated the role of Tracy Lord in the Broadway production, and bought the film rights for herself as a way to overcome her reputation as "box office poison". It worked: The Philadelphia Story was an instant classic, the fifth highest-grossing film of the year, and earned six Oscar nominations including Best Picture and Best Actress. It won two Oscars, for Best Screenplay and Best Actor, for Jimmy Stewart (in what is CLEARLY a Supporting role).
The Apartment (Billy Wilder, 1960) "Did you hear me, Miss Kubelik? I absolutely adore you." "Shut up and deal." Perfection. Billy Wilder's depressive romantic comedy works almost in spite of itself, solely because of the star power of its leads. Shirley Maclaine is magical as elevator operator Fran Kubelik, in a relationship with married man Fred MacMurray, who uses employee Jack Lemmon's apartment for his extra-marital assignations. I've never found Jack Lemmon attractive EXCEPT for in this movie, in which he is downright swoon-worthy as he cares for Fran's broken heart. Nominated for 10 Oscars, The Apartment actually won Best Picture, as well as Best Director and Original Screenplay.
When Harry Met Sally... (Rob Reiner, 1989) One of the greatest screenplays ever written. When Sally drives Harry to New York from Chicago after they graduate from college, Harry asserts that men and women cannot be friends, because sex always gets in the way. Sally disagrees. Over the course of the next decade, they randomly run into each other a few times, and eventually settle into a kind of friendship... that eventually turns into a kind of attraction. Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan have a wholly surprising chemistry as the leads, and Carrie Fisher and Bruno Kirby are even better as their best friends who fall in love at first sight.
Written as part of the weekly blogathon hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves. Join in the fun by picking three films that fit the week's theme and telling us a bit about them!
Ah, the love triangle. The time-honored tradition of two men going after the same woman... or one woman falling for two different guys at the same time (yeah, it usually doesn't go the other way around). It is a situation fraught with tension. Or, at least, it can be. I can only imagine how frustrating this must be in real life, but in movies it can sometimes be fun.
The Philadelphia Story (George Cukor, 1940) I suppose you COULD call this a "love square" since Katharine Hepburn's Tracy Lord has three suitors.... except that the third man (John Howard's poor George) is really never part of the "love" part of the equation. Tracy divorced C.K. Dexter Haven (Cary Grant) for his alcoholism, and now she's set to marry the respectable and utterly boring George, who worships her. But then undercover newspaper reporter Mike Connor (Jimmy Stewart) shows up and sparks fly as friendly competition picks up between all three of them (this is Kate Hepburn we're talking about, after all). Everyone knows she isn't going to end up marrying George (poor, poor George), but will she fall back in love with (read: realize she never fell out of love with) Dexter, or will she fall hard enough for the stalwart Mike? The three leads could not have been more perfectly cast (except perhaps for the two men Hepburn originally wanted, Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy - of course), and despite the manic plot the whole thing is fleet-footed in that way that only comedies of the 1930s and 40s are.
Victor/Victoria (Blake Edwards, 1982) Alright, now pay attention, this one's kinda complicated. Out of work opera singer Victoria Grant (Julie Andrews) is broke and starving in Paris when she runs into Carroll Todd (Robert Preston). Together, they hatch a plan to become the toast of the town: Victoria will play the role of Victor, a female impersonator. She sings as herself, then at the end of the act, rips off her "wig" to "reveal" herself as a man! Because Julie Andrews is SO BUTCH! But then Chicago club owner King Marchand (James Garner) and his girlfriend Norma (Lesley Ann Warren, the REAL star of this movie) show up, and King falls in lust/love with Victor. I mean, Victoria. Because he's absolutely positive that there's no way she's really a man (probably because he's an American. I mean, what do the French know, right?). But Norma is convinced her beau is falling for a man, because she may be a ditz, but she's not completely.... well, no, really, she is completely dumb. But now King is caught in the middle, between a crazy dumb chick and a woman playing a man playing a woman. A lot of the very smart things Victor/Victoria has to say about gender, sexuality, love, and attraction are undercut somewhat by the fact that "Victor" really doesn't exist, but to be honest, that doesn't really matter, because Blake Edwards is in top form here, perfectly staging every single scene in this gag-filled movie musical. And the music by Henry Mancini is pretty damn great, too. Come for Julie's iconic "Le Jazz Hot", stay for the beautiful, hugely effective ballad "Crazy World". And then there's Lesley Ann Warren, doing the greatest dumb blonde routine this side of Jean Hagen in Singin' in the Rain.
3 (Tom Tykwer, 2011) What if a couple in a long-term relationship fell, independently of each other, for the same man? That is the question posed by Tom Tykwer's film, and it's a totally contemporary, worthy question. And the best part is, most "love triangles" are really Vs, with one person attracted to two others at the same time. But here, that third line gets filled in, creating a TRUE love triangle. It's a fascinating film, kind of like Tykwer's breakthrough Run Lola Run without the action sequences, but with all that energy turned into sex/sexiness.
