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SOME LIKE IT HOT (COLLECTOR'S EDITION)
Directed & Produced by: Billy Wilder.
Written by: Wilder & I.A.L. Diamond.
Released by: MGM.
Country of Origin: USA. 122 min. Not Rated.
With: Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, George Raft, Pat O'Brien & Joe E. Brown.
DVD Features: New documentary: "The Making of Some Like It Hot". New documentary: "The Legacy of Some Like It Hot". Commentary featuring interviews with Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, Paul Diamond (son of I.A.L. Diamond) and writers Lowell Ganz & Babaloo Mandel. "Nostalgic Look Back" with Tony Curtis. "Memories from the Sweet Sues" featurette. " Virtual Hall of Memories" film clip compilation. Original pressbook gallery. Original theatrical trailer. English & French subtitles. English & French audio.

Did he or didn’t he say it. Almost any discussion of Billy Wilder’s ribald sex comedy leads to Tony Curtis allegedly comparing making out with Marilyn Monroe to kissing Hitler. He comes clean both in this new edition’s commentary and the making-of documentary. Well, sort of. He admits he probably did say it, but never intended it as an insult but as a joke, as if filming a love scene with Monroe could be described. (“What do you expect me to say?”) His explanation, though, doesn’t match with the memory of Jack Lemmon or Barbara Diamond, the wife of cowriter I.A.L. Diamond. According to her, both Lemmon and Curtis were told by Wilder that in their scenes with the unpredictable Monroe, they had to be perfect in every take. Whatever take Monroe succeeded in would be printed, creating for her costars both a rewarding and exasperating experience. (In the “Nostalgic Look Back” conversation with critic Leonard Maltin, from the 2001 DVD release, Curtis denies even making the comment.) Regardless, the otherwise candid Curtis does admit he did get aroused in the said hot and heavy love scene, which caused the farce to be banned in Kansas.

Many of the anecdotes of Monroe’s behavior – the tardiness, the flubbed lines – may be familiar, but the sources (including archival footage of Wilder) set the tales apart from idle gossip. The on- and off-set turbulence involving the star is much discussed (the comedy would be her third to last film), making this edition alluring to her fans, though writers Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel also focus on how the screenplay flies in the face of convention. But on a whole, the commentary contains much of the same information found in the disc’s two new documentaries and is rarely diverting, except for the occasional blunt barb from Curtis. Don’t expect him to be invited to the Actors Studio any time soon. He lays into the Stanislavsky-based practitioners, calling them nuts and blaming them for indoctrinating Monroe. (Paula Strasberg was ever-present on the set coaching Monroe). And still admiring the icon’s voluptuous figure, he criticizes the current crop of female stars at this year’s Academy Awards: “There wasn’t a pair of tits in the place, I’m telling you.” Kent Turner
July 25, 2007