This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

The Worst Film Ever

Best movie ever!

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

I liked Debbie Reynolds (who nonetheless looked as if she could be as bland as the movie's main quirk, a trope met from Topper and Capra, to movies with Pitt or Bridges, always lacking eeriness; but here, she wasn't, she gives some kind of a Method acting) playing a man being a woman, she made a good role, I liked Curtis' talk with Carmel about felonies, and the 'Psycho' spoof, with the cellar and the inspector in the street.The script showcases a guy's strong wish to know that his deceased friend has been redeemed, saved. From exhaustion, alcohol and hunger, he sleeps, and in his dream his demised pal shows up as a girl (this way, George mourns him, by expressing his asexual love for his friend), and also gets a 2nd chance, to behave better …. It has all been a dream. And in his dream, the writer saw his friend redeemed. Charlie has been dead all along, since the opening scene. And instead of Charlie returning from his ocean rest, a dog will guard George's newfound love. Let us distinguish idea, quirk, look, style; the idea is of the dream and redemption, with mourning and longing, the quirk is the mentioned trope, the look is astonishing, the style is a '60s salad.I enjoyed the '60s glamor. There are parties with nice statuesque, shapely women. Joanna Barnes, Laura Devon, Myrna Hansen are so good-looking, and so is the movie itself, which I expected from so reputed a director, but in fact this is a modest _glam comedy (a few scenes were good, once the spoof begins), not very inspired or funny, averagely amusing certainly, not always in the best taste.I have read somewhere an obviously wrong plot summary: 1st, all could have been George's dream, from drunkenness and hunger, and in fact it has all been a dream, since the blonde who shows up at the denouement, and her dog, have previous lives, a past, they don't just show up mysteriously, claiming to be another beings; and 2nd, Charlie isn't punished again, but released, redeemed, for her unwillingness to take advantage of the inexperienced guy who proposed her, Charlie behaved better as a woman, ceased manipulating others. The idea being that, in George's dream, Charlie did 'change his ways', became better. But the director wished to save the twist for the denouement, instead of allowing it to permeate the plot, to shine from inside the plot.The screwball and the satire were mediocre, the spoof worked. It didn't seem to me like a good movie (though it has exciting or very satisfying scenes), because of the lousy script (which was however a hit, there's an American infatuation with this kind of bland fantasy, about the dead being given more time on Earth) and its _soullessness, its glamorizing of shallow beings (not entirely, but almost devoid of humane reactions), though the idea of the script certainly has charm (which, as a matter of fact, in retrospect subverts the _soullessness, as it has all been George's longing, his search for a redemptive solution), so I rank it as a charming movie, as a '60s salad of glamor. There's a Protestant tale of retribution, _expectably devoid of dramatic force, and a _glam comedy. One's not supposed to be awed by the director or the fame. I mostly dislike the quirk of the script, the avatars of a dead person, the idea of justice, because of its defining blandness, seen in countless other movies, it has a Protestant flavor, but it's something that apparently the American audiences enjoy. Otherwise, the comedy, made in a _glam style, seems a bit heartless, a bit soulless (though the twist might change this, as it has been George's way of dreaming a generous resolution, of seeing his friend redeemed, saved, changed albeit posthumously), and its satire and social world, uninspiring.

I am going to give this lousy movie a "6", mostly due to the acting of Debbie Reynolds, Tony Curtis, and (best of all) Walter Matthau in trying to lift the idiotic plot. Also it's a nod to Vincent Minelli, a director who when good is indeed good - but not here.I have nothing against sex in comedy: they go hand in hand ever since Aristophanes wrote LYSISTRATA. George Axelrod was no Aristophanes (he would barely touch that master's knees). However, he could construct plays of interest (THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH) and he had a hand in the screenplays of a number of first rate film (Wilder's version of THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH, BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S, THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (1962 version)). But this film is crap. The story should be more promising: Charlie is the friend of fellow writer George (Tony Curtis), and both are ladies men. While on the yacht of Hollywood producer Sir Leopold Sartori (Matthau) he makes a play for Lady Rusty Sartori (Laura Devon), and is caught by the husband. What follows may be based on the popular idea of the fate of film producer Thomas Ince in 1924 on William Randolph Hearst's yacht. Charlie is shot dead jumping overboard. His body is not recovered. Friend George is supposed to handle the funeral. Only a few people show up - Charlie's sex escapades and his debts left him with few friends. George finds he has been left executor of a bankrupt and debt encrusted estate, and he can't do anything to fix it.Shortly after all the mourners leave, and after George falls asleep, his doorbell is knocked on. He finds a young man named Bruce Minton III (Pat Boone) with a woman who seems to be in shock. The woman is Debbie Reynolds, whom Minton found wondering around the highway naked and dazed. Minton does put her into his coat, but deposits her (out of necessity - for want of any sensible explanation) with an outraged George. George allows her to spend the night, but the next day she suddenly reveals that she is the dead Charlie, cruelly reincarnated as a woman (albeit an attractive woman). When George finally realizes this he tries to help Charlie get back to normal. But Charlie has other ideas. Like blackmailing old girlfriends and romancing every man in Hollywood - starting with Sir Leopold, whom he/she owes a "favor" to.That is the foundation of this story. There have been attempts to do justice to reincarnation stories, but this is hardly the best attempt. Axelrod basically gets his best jabs when the female Charlie keeps acting too masculine (he/she slaps the rear of a female employee of the beauty parlor he/she is attending). That Charlie and George inevitably start falling for each other (despite their mutual realization of how sick the situation is) is inevitable, but it too is not funny.Still, as I said, the leads and some of the supporting actors (including an up-and-coming Ellen Burstyn) give a good try for it. Best is Matthau, who (despite a poor Hungarian accent) does well as Sir Leopold (a film clone of the real English movie producer/mogul, Sir Alexander Korda, who was married to the gorgeous Merle Oberon for many years). He is childish, monstrous, and inept in trying to be smooth at the same time. But this material is lousy, and it is a monument to Matthau's ability that he pushes it as far as he can. Reynolds is too shrill at times at the transformation she has suffered, and is best as the poisonous blackmailer/user. Curtis is fine, but has few moments to rise in the material given him. Boone does well, but he has little to do but look like a love-sick puppy dog towards Reynolds.See it once for the cast and Minelli, and then never watch it again if you can avoid it.

**SPOILERS** 1960's screwball comedy involving a philandering heel who's luck runs out when he's caught with both his pants down and the wife of a big Hollywood producer ending up shot and deep sixth-ed at the very beginning of the movie.Having a memorial service for the departed screenwriter Charlie Sorel, Harry Madden,instead of the almost 100 friends and associates that were expected to attend only four show up with a very uncomfortable George Wellingtion Tracy, Tony Curtis, Charlie's best and only friend being forced to give the sermon. Tracy being the executor of Charlie's estate finds out, among all the other exploits in Charlie's life, that he was stuck with a $75,000.00 bill on Charlies part to the IRS.Tracy being visited that evening by this rich mama's boy Bruce Minton III, Pat Boone, who happened to notice this young nude woman, Debbie Reynolds, walking aimlessly on the beach. Bruce did what a gentleman would do by wrapping her in his overcoat and driving her, with the woman giving Bruce directions, to Charlie's place to spend the evening.The next morning the woman wakes up screaming and in a cold sweat. Everything came back to her and with her amnesia now gone she remembers who she is! she's Charlie Sorel! a Man in a Woman's body. At first Tracy feels that that all this is just one of his, the late Charlie Sorel's, many girlfriends who's trying to freak him out for one reason or another, just take your pick, that had to do with his friend Charlie shabby and trashy treatment of her. It doesn't take long for Tracy to realize that Charlie is really Charlie with information that Charlie tells him about himself and the late Charlie Sorel that only Charlie, and Tracy, would know!Charlie at first is repulsed at the fact that he's a woman who to Charlie, when he was a man, was nothing but a toy to play with and throw away when he got tired of it. Charlie later starts to like his/her new body and uses it to blackmail his former bedmates by telling them that he, or she's, the late Charlie Sorel's widow Charleen and knows all about his affair from a diary that he kept that she's, unless paid off, going to have published.Tracy who's now up to his neck in his friends Charlie/Charleen new life sees the wall's closing in on him with the police and IRS wanting to know what were the circumstances of Charlie's demise. It turns out that Tracy, Charlies best friend and executor of his will, has gotten very friendly with Charlie's killer Hollywood producer Sir Leopold Sartori, Walter Matthau, who's been found innocent in Charlie's killing by reason of justifiable homicide. Tracy has also gotten very close with Sartori's busty young wife Rusty,Laura Devon, who Sir Leopold caught together in bed with Charlie just before he blasted him! Could it be that instead of justifiable homicide it was really premeditated murder on both Sir Leopold and Tracy's part?Trying to get Charlie out of the country Tracy goes to Sir Leopold begging him to, with his extensive political connections, get Charlie a false passport which Sir Leopold agrees to do. Still the crafty old fox has other plans in mind. Sir Leopold plans to trick the desperate Tracy into leave Charlie alone in his, or the late Charlie Sorel's, house so he can make a play for him, or her, himself. In a strange quark of fate, or reincarnation, Sir Leopold Charlie's obsessed killer has become Charleen's obsessed lover and the object of Charlie's uncountable lust, for Rusty, that caused Sir Leopold to do in Charlie in the first place. Rusty ends up being the person who does in Charleen for being the reason for her old man Sir Leopold fooling around with another woman! The woman who's the person that she was fooling around when Charleen was a man Charlie Sorel! How's That For a Mouthfull!Somewhat hard to follow at times with Debbie Reynolds trying to be both Charlie and Charleen, in her voice and actions, but still worth watching. There's also Pat Boone's Bruce Minter III falling under the spell of Charleen/Charlie and with his mother away on business, and having the massive Minter Estate all for himself, lets it all hang out by letting his hair down and confessing his love for her. Bruce does that with what looks like the biggest diamond ring in existence! Only to later pass out from drinking too much wine and champaign thinking, in his babyish mind, that it's only lemonade. Charlie does comes back again at the end of the movie "Goodbye Charlie" in a new body but can't communicate and it looks as if his good friend Tracy also is unable to recognize him. Since he, Charlie, has a speaking problem that gives those of us watching the film something to howl about.

This is one of those movies that is fun to watch, the premise is of course impossible, but enjoyable none the less. If you liked THE LAST TIME I SAW ARCHIE or MERRILY WE LIVE you will be very pleased that you took the time to check out this gem. Tony Curtis and Debby Reynolds well, they live up to their comedic potential in this one.