ReaderKenka
Let's be realistic.
Merolliv
I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.
ChanFamous
I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.
Bella
How To Marry A Millionaire (1953) is a Comedy/Drama/Romance film starring Marilyn Monroe as Pola Debevoise, Betty Garble as Loco Dempsey, and Lauren Bacall as Schatze Page. It begins with Schatze Page in her new apartment that she will be sharing with the other two girls. They decide to go on a search to marry a millionaire, as the movie suggests, and find love in the process. The sets, costumes, and acting is excellent.The set designs are elegant and lovely. The apartment has a nice brick wall outside with a table set up for drinking, mostly, of course. The New York scenery in the background is perfect and may make you wish that was the view from your living room. The walls are light purple will large paintings, golden candles, white chairs, and the piano is golden with engraved designs around it making it the perfect 1950s bachelorette pad.While on their search, the girls are dressed to impress. Loco's blonde and braided up-do is stunning with her all pink sparkly dress and matching clutch, and long earrings. Schatze is wearing a loose green dress with dark brown fur at the top and stunning pearl bracelets. Marilyn's platinum blonde hair is styled into a gorgeous bob. Her dress is dark pink with a diagonal strap covered in sparkles and it is paired with her signature red lips and a dark pink sparkling clutch. There are many costume changes throughout the film and they are all stunning.The acting is great. Marilyn is sweet and she has a soft voice which is nice to listen to and she draws attention with her appearance and performance as well. The other two stars are stunning as well. Lauren Bacall is sophisticated and serious about her addiction to shopping. Betty is great at portraying her character Loco as a spoiled girl who knows how to play with an manipulate others.I would recommend this film to anyone who likes old movies or movies about materialistic women. If you enjoyed Breakfast at Tiffany's or Gentlemen Like Blondes because of the lead actresses and their characters than you should definitely watch this 90-minute film.This film is spectacular and the ending is superb. It has funny moments, romantic moments, and sad moments as well. The twists and turns of the film are both well performed and well written. The directors and editors all put a lot of work into this film and did an excellent job creating a timeless film with perfect costumes and design sets and great acting. The only reason that I didn't give this film a 10 is that there are a few unfunny and boring moments, but for the most part it is a solid comedy. It also goes over the theme of materialism and whether or not money equals happiness.
Charles Herold (cherold)
How to Marry a Millionaire is a very 1950s movie. A glossy technicolor cinemascope flick that starts with a remarkably long and tedious overture, the movie is slickly made and stars three Hollywood legends, Marilyn Monroe, Betty Grable, and Lauren Bacall, as three golddiggers on the make. It's a story that was made several times in the 30s and 40s but doesn't age well. Bacall seems smart and capable, yet instead of starting a business, which is what someone like her would do nowadays, she says the ultimate goal of any woman is to be married and she decides she'll take money over love. She also seems too smart to fail to second-guess her instincts about the guy she doesn't know is rich.Monroe has a reputation for playing the dumb blonde, but here she's really more of the insecure blonde whose refusal to wear her glasses in public has her bumping into walls. The actual dumb blonde is Betty Grable, who is amusingly earthy as a genial idiot who is stupider than a typical 13-year-old.Monroe and Grable are pretty amusing, and Monroe has her typical radiance, but they fail to elevate the predictable story and the bland comedy. There are occasional bright moments, as when Bacall says she likes older men like "that old guy from the African Queen," but most of the movie is stupid and rather witless.The movie's portrayal of women is also pretty awful. Not only is their plot to catch millionaires creepy, but they rent someone's apartment and then sell all their furniture, which is played for laughs even though its criminal behavior. All of the women and most of the men are actually pretty awful people, and it's weird how the movie doesn't seem to even recognize that. I read an interesting critique that portrayed this movie as anti-feminist propaganda determined to show women that their proper place was as pleasure objects for men, and it's a reasonable theory (it did come out just a few years after The Second Sex was published). It's certainly a movie that has aged poorly, especially when it trots out one of the most common terrible features of 1950s movies - the endless fashion show, and a movie that feels like a low blow in the war between the sexes.Not really worth watching except for the stars, who put their all into this terrible thing.
SimonJack
The usually smart, clever and calm Lauren Bacall plays quite a different character in "How to Marry a Millionaire." She is very tongue-in-cheek funny as the know-it-all gold digger. But she has it all wrong. And that's one of the very funny undertones of the plot for this comedy romance. Bacall is Schatze Page, one of a threesome of females who are on the prowl in New York to snag wealthy husbands. That may seem a strange theme to modern day audiences, but it was something of a reality of American culture in the mid-20th century. Probably few women actually made such pursuits, but it was something that the culture talked about back then. I remember hearing women joke about moving to New York to find a rich husband. So, that made for a funny and entertaining movie. Bacall didn't have top billing for this film, either. That went to Marilyn Monroe, followed by Betty Grable. Monroe plays Pola Debevoise and Grable plays Loco Dempsey. One may see the humor in those names, as well. Both of them play ditzy blonds, but Grable out-ditzies Monroe. Her character is by far the funniest. One expected Monroe to play such roles – it was her film persona and, somewhat, her real life persona. But, for Grable, this was an excellent portrayal. Of course, there are men in the story and the lives of these women. All of the cast perform well. William Powell has a nice supporting role that is very unusual. His is the only one that isn't comedy. But the part fits beautifully in the plot, and I can think of no one better to have the role of J.D. Hanley. Powell was 61 years old when this film came out. He made only one more film, "Mr. Roberts" in 1955, before retiring. Powell is one of the classy great performers who never won an Oscar, although he was nominated three times. And, unlike many stars, he retired while his star still shown bright for quality films. He lived another 29 years until age 91 in 1984. The humorous situations in this film are punctuated with occasional witty lines. Some catch one by surprise and lead to bursts of laughter. Here's my favorite. Loco and Pola have been gone for days and Schatze is worried about being stuck with the monthly rent for their expensive Fifth Avenue flat. She is lamenting her problem with Tom Brookman, played by Cameron Mitchell. Tom says, "Haven't they even written to you?" Schatze replies, "How can they? They're illiterate."
richieandsam
HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIREOK guys... I watched this with my 12 year old daughter... and once the film finished, she asked me if she could write the review for a change. I think she has done a great job with it too... This is her opinion. Sammy... take it away!"It wasn't a bad movie, I did enjoy it.The story is about three models, Loco (Betty Grable), Pola (Marilyn Monroe) and Schatze (Lauren Bacall), who want to marry a millionaire. They rent an apartment in New York and sell all the furniture to get money. They spend a lot of time with rich men, but none of them are really their type. They persuade themselves that they are and end up falling in love with them anyway. But when Loco finds a man to bring her shopping home, he falls in love with Schatze. Knowing she is a model, he asks to see them in a private show. If Schatze knew he was a millionaire, he would look like a completely different person to her.I have never seen a storyline like this before, so I think is was original and creative. I can't say I didn't laugh when Marilyn walked into the wall, as she was playing a girl blind as a bat. She had glasses, but never wore them as she thought they made her look unattractive. Her mind was changed by one special man's opinion.One thing I didn't understand, is the guy with the eye-patch. He always had this patch over his left eye, but when he was examining a plane schedule, he lifted his eye-patch to get a better look. Surely, if you wear an eye-patch, it's cover up a missing eye, or something like that. But if he needs to take it of to read a schedule, why wear it at all? I don't get it...I do love my retro movies, which most people wouldn't expect from a twelve year-old girl, but it's true. This is a very old movie (to me, anyway) and this always means terrible effects, but why would you add the backgrounds as an effect, when they were just walking around a real set with the same background. They looked so fake it was unbelievable. Why not just film them in the set instead of recreating it with graphics? They confuse me.Overall, I think this movie is slightly amusing and generally enjoyable. I'm going to give this movie a 6 out of 10. I don't know why, it's just my gut instinct."Why marry a poor when you can find a rich man just as easy?"Good work honey. I agree with Sammy mostly... I expected the effects to be terrible... the film was made in 1953. I also had never seen a Marilyn Monroe film, and she did a great job in this. She was very funny as a blind lady. She did make me laugh quite a lot throughout. The acting was good apart from Betty Grable. I thought she let the film down. She could have done better. The story was OK, but I thought it could have had a bit more happen, although I found it amusing how she rented out an apartment and sold the landlord furniture. You couldn't get away with that these days.I agree with Sammy and will give it 6 out of 10.For more reviews, please check out my Facebook page:https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ordinary-Person-Movie- Reviews/456572047728204?ref=hl