Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Who already watched to most movie from the Master and compare with Kiss me stupid has a great disapoitment,the miscasting is around two actors Dean Martin and Ray Waslton,the first really a annoying guy,he actually think including in the movie he is best than Elvis and Beatles....a second class singer who didn't has a charm neither charism.Walston was a wrong choice to the role,but Kim Novak provides a sexy acting about Polly the Pistol....Wilder drive forces in this character who proves to be later a sole character which deserve a best review of the entire picture!!Resume: First watch: 1990 / How many: 3 / Source: TV-DVD / Rating: 7

Jealous piano teacher Orville Spooner (Ray Walston) sends his beautiful wife, Zelda (Felicia Farr), away for the night while he tries to sell a song to a famous nightclub singer Dino (Dean Martin), who is stranded in town.The Catholic Legion of Decency strongly objected to the completed film and it was condemned, the second film to get such an honor -- the first being "Baby Doll" in 1956. One can easily see why, as while there is no nudity, there is plenty of humor revolving around prostitution, adultery and and Dean Martin being a "sex maniac".A. H. Weiler of the New York Times called the film "pitifully unfunny" and "obvious, plodding, short on laughs and performances and long on vulgarity." This seems unfair. While it is not among Billy Wilder's best work, even Wilder's average films are better than many other people's greatest attempts. I can only say now (roughly fifty years after the film debuted) that while it was not perfect, it had its moments and was quite bold in its own way.

When this was released in 1964 it received a loud and hearty round of indifference from the critics. I don't know why. It's hard boiled, amusing, romantic, and ironic. It's not Wilder and Diamond's best work but it's a satisfying blend of funny incidents, single entendres, and moments that almost approach drama.I'd guess there are at least two important reasons for the general lack of enthusiasm. One is that maybe Billy Wilder should never have directed such successful works as "Some Like It Hot" and "The Apartment" in the previous few years. He got too many awards. The bar was lifted. After his great successes, everything had to be a masterpiece. His critical S&P rating underwent what's called a "correction." Another reason is that this is, after all, a movie in the classical style appearing in 1964. That's the year of the Beatles and Richard Lester and "A Hard Day's Night" and Carnaby Street and LSD and Timothy Leary. (Kids, you'll have to Google all that.) Wilder always had his actors stick to the script. (He wrote it.) And the camera wasn't carried by some guy on roller skates. Wilder's comedy, while always a little vulgar and often biting, demanded the viewer's attention. It was grounded, while much of pop culture was becoming absurd. I mean, here is Wilder, grinding out a more ribald version of the delicate Ernst Lubitsch type while critics are gobbling up Andy Warhol's "Sleep", an hour-long movie of John Giorno sleeping for five hours.The story itself, though derived from an Italian play, is the kind that would interest Wilder. An ambitious, small-town song writer (Walston, my co-star in the excellent and under-appreciated "From the Hip") manages to trap pop singer Dean Martin in his house overnight. Walston tries to palm off a cheap local whore (Novak) as his wife (Farr), so that Martin doesn't wake up with a headache from lackanookie. Instead, Walston winds up spending the night with Novak and Farr spends the night with Dino. It all ends happily.True, it's not that well written. Walston is overwrought. He's jealous of his wife, okay, but in fact he's unbelievably jealous and it's not particularly amusing when he tears the shirt off a fourteen-year-old piano student and throws him out of the house -- just for LOOKING at Farr. And the rest of the plot does have its longueurs. But none of these flaws torpedo what is basically a mildly diverting piece of entertainment. Dean Martin is especially enjoyable as his narcissistic self. Novak's coarse accent sounds more like Chicago than Jersey City. And Cliff Osmond, as a co-conspirator, isn't funny just because he's tall and fat and has a flat facial plane. So what? Even the silly songs (from an early Gershwin flop) are enjoyable, although they are no good. I'm qualified to make that judgment since I'm an expert musician, once having played the hydrocrystalophone in the Short Hills, New Jersey, Marching Band and Perloo Society.You know, it's really a sin to expect too much of a movie or anything else.

Great premise and situational comedy which feels a lot fresher than it looks. Should have been made in color but the fact that it was done in black in white does help add to the drabness of the principal players lives and town. The part of Orville went to Ray Walston when Peter Sellers suffered a heart attack and had to be replaced. One reviewer here wrote critically of Walston and Novak referring to them as the "bus and truck co." cast and imagines what a film it would have been had Sellers and Marilyn Monroe been cast. Perhaps I misread him but Monroe was never considered for Novak's character, Polly The Pistol. She was to have played Felicia Farr's part, Zelda. He also imagines Jack Lemmon in the part of Orville and although Lemmon is on my very short list of the best actors ever, at the time this film was made, he was too handsome and charismatic and would have been a distraction. I believe Monroe would have pulled the film off it's balance as well whereas Felicia Farr was absolutely perfect. Kim Novak's performance was one of her best and proves that had she been given or had taken the right opportunities she could have had a whole new career in comedy. Ray Walston and Cliff Osmond were brilliantly believable as hapless scheming buddies-n-crime. So if this film needs a "re-work", for me, it wouldn't be tinkering with any of the casting. It would be in making it look as modern as it feels. Believing in the film enough to have sprung for a budget including color film would have helped a lot. It is a comedy gem which deals with the convoluted situation that its main characters create in a not too often seen adult approach and reaction.