Review of Kiss Me, Stupid

Introduction

English teachers are always going on about the importance of punctuation, and the title of this film demonstrates exactly what they`re banging on about. Is the title a request to be kissed by someone who answers to the appelation of "stupid", or a request to be kissed into that condition? In the case of this Billy Wilder/ IAL Diamond comedy, there is a comma between "me" and "stupid", so the former is the correct option.

"Stupid" in this case is Dean Martin, playing Dino, a character that looks, sounds and acts suspiciously like Dean Martin. Taking an unscheduled detour on a midnight flit out of Las Vegas, he winds up in the zero-horse town of Climax, Nevada.

Ray Walston features as Orville J Spooner, piano teacher and architect of Dino`s problems. Insanely jealous, or maybe just insane, he attacks anyone he thinks might be interested in his wife.

Peter Sellers was originally cast in the role of Orville, but a heart attack a few weeks into production invalided him out of the part and necessitated a recasting and reshoot.

Orville writes songs with his best pal, garageman Barney (Cliff Osmond). When Dino breezes into town in search of gas, they hatch a plan to keep him in town overnight and sell him a couple of songs.

Then Orville remembers Dino`s womanising reputation and discovers his wife`s crush on Dino. He has to get his wife out of the house and bring in a substitute. The substitute is cocktail waitress Polly (Kim Novak) and the scene is set for a lot of embarrassed squirming.

Video

Photographed in pin-sharp monochrome Panavision, the movie is presented in 2.35:1. There are a few glitches on the image; the odd scratch.

Audio

The movie comes in unenhanced Dolby 2.0 Mono. The soundtrack is littered with snippets of George and Ira Gershwin tunes, which I like. How about you?

Features

Another bare-bones edition from MGM. You get subtitles, but that`s it. Not even the theatrical trailer you get on the R1 edition. Worryingly, like other recent MGM releases they haven`t even bothered authoring scene selection menus, so you just start the movie from the setup menu. You can navigate with your remote skip keys, but you need to know your way around the movie.

Conclusion

Billy Wilder was the king of stylish, often risque comedy. His career started in 1929 as a screenwriter in Germany. He wrote and/or directed movies as disparate as "The Lost Weekend", "Sunset Boulevard", "Sabrina", "Seven Year Itch", "Some Like It Hot" and "The Apartment". His last movie was "Buddy Buddy" in 1981.

"Kiss Me, Stupid", was made in 1964, at the height of his powers and although it`s not as shocking today as it was at its time of release, there`s more than a hint of the "Indecent Proposal"s about the whole enterprise.