How to Marry a Millionaire.

To all of my blog readers who don't watch classic movies: I apologize if you're bored with all of the old movie reviews that I've been writing lately.

I've been enjoying writing them, myself. :)

This weekend, a friend of our family invited me to come and look through a bunch of old VHS tapes that she had. She was trying to give them away, and she had boxes and boxes of mostly unopened tapes still in their plastic. I claim that I don't like VHS tapes, because of how big and inconvenient they are compared to DVDs, but I went a little crazy when I saw all those movies. :) So I came home with about 25 classic movies- a few that I've seen and a ton that I haven't.

One that I hadn't seen, until last night, was "How to Marry a Millionaire."

I was curious about the movie because I like Lauren Bacall. I love splashy-looking 50s movies. I don't like Marilyn Monroe, but I figured I could put up with her. :)

Lauren Bacall, Marilyn Monroe, and Betty Grable play three models who pool their (scarce) resources to rent out a fancy penthouse apartment, in the hopes of snagging a few millionaires to marry. The movie follows their romantic adventures. In the end, they realize that love is more important than money- only one of the girls actually ends up marrying a millionaire, and she doesn't know he's one until after they marry. :)

The movie was very light and fluffy- it seemed to be over really quickly! It's pretty clever and funny. There's a running gag about how Marilyn's character, who has terrible vision, won't wear her glasses in front of men, so she spends a lot of time stumbling around, running into walls, etc. There were also a few inside jokes related to the stars: Lauren Bacall's character insists that she likes older men, saying, "I've always liked older men. Look at that old fellow what's-his-name in 'The African Queen.' Absolutely crazy about him." :) Lauren Bacall was referring to Humphrey Bogart, of course, who she was married to at the time. There's also a scene where Betty Grable's character hears a Harry James song on the radio...she was married to him at the time.

The clothes are 50s and gorgeous, except for the few outfits that are very immodest. The movie is pretty clean, except for the usual smoking/slight alcohol use, and a few mentions of affairs. One of the girls gets tangled up with a married man, though not necessarily in a romantic way. Overall, a pretty cute movie!

Until next time,