Here's to New Years

I apologize for the hiatus over the past month, but everyone knows that the beginning of the year always gets a little hectic. I would like to start out this year of blogging with a film about New Years, resolutions, and new beginnings. Part black comedy, part drama, part romantic comedy, Billy Wilder's 1960 film The Apartment has it all. It includes slick corporate businessmen in the Madison Avenue heydays, honest guys working their way up through not so honest means, adultery, divorce, deception, rowdy holiday parties, love triangles, the beautiful backdrop of New York City in the winter, and the quest to find true love.

The film stars Jack Lemmon, who would later be working under Wilder again in the steamy Marilyn Monroe film Some Like It Hot and female rat-packer Shirley MacLaine. Lemmon is C.C. Baxter, an honest guy who can't get ahead in corporate America no matter how hard or good he works. Baxter finds himself loaning out his apartment to the major company players (pun intended) who use his apartment as a place to take their mistresses so the wives don't find out. Baxter finds himself being chased out of his apartment at all hours of the night, sleeping on park benches, and catching colds while the high-powered bosses have their fun, messing up his apartment, drinking all his booze, and giving him a bad playboy reputation with all of his nice neighbors. Baxter almost decides to quit entirely when he is given a promotion, on the basis that he loans his apartment out to and only out to big boss Jeff Sheldrake (Fred MacMurray) so Sheldrake can have his affair unbeknown to his wife and two kids.

Baxter realizes that Sheldrake's mistress is none other than elevator girl Fran Kubelik (MacLaine), who Baxter has been crushing on for quite some time. In a parallel plot, Fran wants Sheldrake to leave his family and marry her, though he said their relationship was only a summer fling. He rekindles the romance until Christmastime, when Fran hears at the part about all the past women Sheldrake has made a similar promise to. She tries to commit suicide and C.C. Baxter comes home in time to save her with the help of Dr. and Mrs. Dreyfuss (Jack Kruschen and Naomi Stevens). Fran slowly starts to realize that C.C. Baxter might be the good guy she was always looking for while Baxter starts to think there is no such thing as a good woman. The entire film is centered around the holidays with Fran's suicide at Christmas. The last part of the movie has a great climax on New Years Eve and keeps you guessing if Sheldrake ever gets caught and if C.C. and Fran end up together.

For more information on the film, you can access the reviews, synopsis, and various information provided here, thanks to Filmsite.org. To read the entire script, if you would like to for whatever reason, you can do so here, thanks to DailyScript.com, which provides tons of movie scripts for free. Shirley MacLaine also did and interview/article about what it was like filming and working on The Apartment, which can be read here at the Cinebeats blog.

The film also has tons of acclaim. Premiere Magazine voted it as one of the 50 greatest comedies of all time and it made #80 on AFI's list of Greatest Films of All Time. Total Film ranked Jack Lemmon's performance as C.C. Baxter as #12 in its list of Greatest Performances of All Time. Oscar-wise, the film won for Best Picture, Art Direction, Editing, Best Director, and Original Screenplay. Jack Lemmon was nominated for Best Actor, Shirley MacLaine for Best Actress, Jack Kruschen for Supporting Actor, as well as Cinematography and Sound. The Apartment was also the last black and white film to win an Academy Award for best picture until Spielberg's Schindler's List .

The critics aren't the only ones who adore this movie; it's a big hit with film fans both old and new. The blog Twenty-Four Frames does a great review, critique, and synopsis of the film which can be read here. Another great review can be read here at the Tea at Trianon blogspot. Another positive review can be read here at The Distracted Globe. However, the Film Jock offers a contradictory view on the movie, which I could encourage you to read here and then think about while or after watching the film. As always, I encourage you to watch the film for yourself before letting critics help you make up your mind.