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"Sex and the Single Girl" succeeds almost 50 years later as both a wacky "adult comedy" of its time and as a sociological time capsule of the prevailing attitudes and styles of the mid-60's. IF you're properly tolerant of the now-quaint comedy style of a bygone era paraded here, "SATSG" proves to be an enduring nugget of classic movie "pixie dust" that will continue to charm through multiple viewings.
Of course it helps if (like me, born 1957) you're a boomer who lived through "those days" and remembers vividly those crazy go-go '60's, with all of its kaleidoscopic turbulence and tumult. "SATSG" zooms in to re-examine a topic we'll never exhaust--the tug-of-war of courtship and romance as women and men struggle to "hook up" and sustain relationships over time.
I never learned what Helen Gurley Brown thought of this flippant trashing of her book, which definitely WAS intended to be a call to action for modern girls of the early sixties to live their dreams and joust as equals with men in careers AND in "scoring" romantically. Another author once made the trenchant comment that when you sell a property to Hollywood, you're really giving it up for "mining rights" and what eventually emerges will have only a slight resemblance to the original work. NEVER truer than with "SATSG"! I suspect Helen (like most authors) simply rolled her eyes and cashed the check.
Here the book's themes are just used as the set-up for a 60's sex farce, with pioneering liberated psychologist (and author of the current best seller non-fiction work "Sex and the Single Girl") Helen Gurley Brown (Natalie Wood) being manipulated for an expose by the underhanded, "anything for a scoop" ace reporter of "Stop" magazine, Bob Weston (Tony Curtis, in full, leering hound-dog mode). Bob is determined to find out--at any cost-- whether or not the dewy ingenue, Dr Brown, could possibly be speaking from experience (with a heavily notched bedpost) or (more likely) that she's "giving flying lessons but she's never actually been up in the air".
I'm not going to test your patience with a full plot synopsis here. Suffice it to say that all sorts of improbably kooky scenarios are spun and wrung for maximum cliched laughs; indeed, some of it is PAINFUL to watch now. When I first saw "SATSG" on DVD just a couple years ago, I thought, stunned, that "Henry Fonda and Lauren Bacall would probably like to burn EVERY print of this movie". Indeed, here's Henry, quoted from his Playboy interview in Dec 1981 (question: "what film was the most awful of all"): "SATSG... My agents talked me into it, because they said, you SOB, you're not going to make a living out of Ox-Bow Incident and 12 Angry Men. They can win awards, but they don't make any money. In order to indulge yourself to do films like that, every so often you've got to be in box-office pictures. They were right--it was a terrible picture, but it was box office."
Henry and Lauren Bacall play a miserable middle-aged married couple (in contrast to single, glamorous Wood & Curtis) and both venerable actors are obliged to shriek and cower here as buffoonish caricatures of a stagnant marriage. Poor Lauren Bacall--a mere ten years earlier she was still a pinnacle for male desire in
Written on the Wind (The Criterion Collection)
(HIGHLY recommended), but now is reduced to a spiteful shrewish housewife. HOWEVER even in these undignified roles I was nevertheless struck by how good they both looked, and how they would NOT be considered "decrepit and over the hill" today (in their 40's), as they are automatically assumed to be in their "SATSG" personas.
No matter how well you can tolerate the stereotypes and clunky jokes that likely ring hollow today, let's be GRATEFUL that DVD can keep the memory and indelible image of NATALIE WOOD alive for us now and for future viewers. This is certainly not her finest hour as an actress (let's go with
Splendor in the Grass
for that) but she gamely digs into the material and is an absolute KNOCKOUT throughout the movie (check out her Cleopatra eye make up! Crazy, Man!). Such a unique slice of Hollywood life she lived, and how especially tragic her loss. RJ Wagner at the very least ought to be carrying a Chappaquiddick size anvil of guilt to his grave for his complicity in her death. (Recommended biography:
Natasha: The Biography of Natalie Wood
) TONY CURTIS likewise gives the part his all with his usual leering gusto. Unfortunately Tony was called upon to play this exact same type of part MANY times over the course of the '60's, and it overshadows what a GOOD actor he was capable of being (see
Sweet Smell of Success (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray
]).
--Oh yeah, the comic artistry of the redoubtable LARRY STORCH also!!! Larry (best known for his run on the '60's TV sitcom "F Troop") does his patented splenetic live-action cartoon bit as a harried motorcycle cop in the last reel freeway chase scene of "SATSG". I also have to wedge in at least a sentence to note--and admire--the va-va-voom allure of Fran Jeffries as Tony's jaded girlfriend, Gretchen. Another one dimensional character, but let's face it, this is NOT Edward Albee/Tennessee Williams territory we're in here!
Henry Fonda--with all due respect, this is anything BUT a terrible movie! OK I'll admit there are a LOT of valid reasons to dislike "SATSG". You COULD dismiss it today as just "kitsch" and I really couldn't argue with you. The male/female interactions are ridiculous or worse, and the resolution of Natalie/Tony's sparring COULD leave some sputtering with disbelief if not indignation. Nevertheless, Natalie's beauty and appeal--and I admit, my own nostalgic tolerance for the time it was made--elevate "SATSG" to an "All Time Top Ten" status selection for me. This is a movie I see over and over again and never get tired of; I recognize that not many viewers will have all their bells rung as I have, but for no other reason than because I LOVE IT, I enthusiastically award the full five stars to "SATSG".
And--important postscript--if nothing else, "SATSG" did serve as the primary template/inspiration for a MUCH better, indeed, successful on MULTIPLE levels "tribute" movie,
Down with Love (Widescreen Edition)
a generation later. --But that will have to be another review!
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Garden Mist
This movie is a winner! Natalie Wood and Tony Curtis shine!
Reviewed in Canada on July 19, 2013