HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE (1953)

(Week 2: Lauren Bacall)

HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE (1953)

Directed by Jean Negulesco

From the way they packaged this DVD, you wouldn't know that aside from Marilyn Monroe, this film actually has two other big stars: Betty Grable and Lauren Bacall. Monroe's part is actually the smallest and least thought out of the three, so that those who watch this film hoping to see a lot of Monroe would be disappointed. 

But Bacall is my favorite, and lucky for me her part is the biggest. Her story arc is one that we follow most intimately. The film is about three models living together and looking for rich husbands. Bacall plays Schatze, a shrewd divorcée whose finances are so bad she scrapes by by renting out her furniture. Well, not hers. The furniture belongs to Freddie Denmark, the mysterious man whose fancy apartment she is renting as a part of her plan to trap rich men. 

Grable and Monroe play hopelessly naive goofballs that buy into Schatze's ideal. Grable's character agrees to go with a married man to his "lodge," thinking she would meet other eligible millionaires. There ended up being just the two of them. She got sick and wasn't able to go home. Monroe's character is extremely nearsighted but refuses to wear glasses for fear of seeming unattractive to men. There isn't much to her storyline, but I did get a few laughs from watching her run into things.

(from filmhash.com)

These characters are delightful but unbelievable. It was hard to enjoy a movie with three story lines in none of which I could invest, due to their flimsy nature. Let me elaborate more on Bacall's character. Schatze doesn't believe that poor men are bad; she just would rather marry a rich one. Bacall, as always, comes across as intelligent and slightly rigid. She keeps the other girls in line and fends off the underserving men. Meanwhile she falls in love with two men, a rich older man and a poor age-appropriate one. Bacall seems out of place in such an old-fashioned, somewhat sexist plot where an intelligent woman would rather use her brain to reap men's wealth than acquire independence. She seems too smart to play a gold digger believably. (In contrast, Bacall would later recreate Katharine Hepburn's role of Tess Harding from WOMAN OF THE YEAR on Broadway, a woman whose husband was threatened by her success.) Schatze goes a great length to refuse the poor man she falls for and convince herself that she is in love with the wealthy one. By the end of the film you do wonder if she is really all that smart.

(from Amazon.com)

The overall plot is pretty hilarious. I reviewed the summary on Wikipedia right after watching the film and it still made me laugh. But the execution is poor. The script just isn't that funny or engaging or genuine. Schatze doesn't quite seem desperate enough for us to understand her necessity for a wealthy husband, and the other two characters are just too shallow to be taken seriously. It may be a feast for the eyes to see three very attractive women in such a glamorous way, but it is hard to sympathize with the characters of HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE.