What a way to go 1964
What a way to go 1964
User Reviews
To describe WHAT A WAY TO GO as an ultra-light 1960s confection would be an understatement: frothy, foolish, and seeking no more than to be mildly entertaining, it is a classic of its kind and of its era.
The plot is episodic. When multi-millionaire Louisa May Foster tries to give away her money she finds herself slapped onto a psychiatrist’s couch—where she details the story of a little girl from the wrong side of the tracks who was only interested in marrying for love. But as fate would have it, every husband she touched turned to gold, and their successes spelled finish to the marriage in no uncertain terms, with each widowhood leaving Louisa even more fabulously wealthy than before. What’s a poor little rich girl to do? The charm here is in the cast and the production values. Although she offered considerably more in her most celebrated films, Shirley MacLaine had a remarkable way with light comedy, and she pulls out all the stops as the eternal widow, at times sassy, at times silly, but never less than completely watchable. Her unlikely co-stars—Dean Martin, Dick Van Dyke, Paul Newman, Robert Mitchum, Gene Kelly, Robert Cummings and (in her final film) the amazing Margaret Dumont—are also up to the task.
The humor is both obvious and sly, lampooning various rags-to-riches (or in one case riches-to-riches) stereotypes with a wink, a nod, and now and then an unexpectedly sophisticated bit of wit. The film works best when it gently mocks both itself and the more obvious cinematic conventions of its day, as when Louisa recalls each of her marriages with the words «it was like one of those movies where. » Everything from silent film to musicals gets a poke, and over-budgeted romantic blockbusters suddenly become considerably more comic than you’d ever imagine.
The production values are first rate, and to say there is always something to look at on the screen would be an understatement: they are deliberately and often deliciously over the top—and often as amusing as the performances. (The «Lush Budget» sequence, in which MacLaine changes gowns every few seconds, is particularly witty.) True, the movie is a no-brainer, but it is a fun one. Only a sour-puss could resist! Recommended.
Gary F. Taylor, aka GFT, Amazon Reviewer
In the 1960’s, you could not argue with the star power of Shirley MacLaine. She was probably in at least twenty movies in that decade. This is a worthy showcase to her talent and hold ups well for the most part. The movie is very funny in parts and when its not out-and-out funny, you are still smiling. Its nice to see Paul Newman and Robert Mitchum in a light comedy, and Dean Martin and Dick Van Dyke were good also.
Margaret Dumont as Shirley’s mother was very funny and I was sorry she was not in more scenes. All those years of sharing a screen with the Marx Brothers certainly rubbed off.
Edith Head must have billed 20th Century Fox for a million hours of OT. She creates about six hundred costumes for Shirley and the guys. I think she got a nomination for this, but then again, in her case that’s not saying anything special.
Shirley MacLaine again proves that she is quite an actress in this 1964 film.
Showing that money isn’t everything, Shirley keeps marrying and losing her husbands to sudden deaths. Along the way, they leave her with a bundle;therefore, she accumulates a vast amount of money. However, this is the film where m is m-money makes one absolutely miserable. Done with comic flair, the picture is just terrific.
My favorite sequence is with Dick Van Dyke. He is just a poor sole when he meets Shirley, but after they wed, the work ethic sets in as he eagerly gets everyone to hop on down to hoppers. The dough pours in but Van Dyke just works, works and works until he falls down dead!
Hop on down and catch this film at your local video. Then, sit back and enjoy life!
If the fans of the various leading men and Shirley MacLaine just attended this film, What A Way To Go was certainly guaranteed to be a hit at the box office. It would have to be to justify the salaries of the cast involved.
Her pattern is to marry men who are poor with one exception and they become rich and then meet with bizarre deaths. Her husbands in order were Dick Van Dyke, Paul Newman, Robert Mitchum, and Gene Kelly. Mitchum was already rich, but became incredibly much richer while married to Shirley. He also met the most bizarre death in the film which you’ll have to see because it’s too funny to reveal.
Kelly played a song and dance man who played in a clown makeup. Each of the segments involved a dream sequence where Shirley relates to Cummings that in her ideal stage of the marriage it reminded her of some happy movie genre. In the Kelly sequence it involved a musical and we get to see Shirley dance which she didn’t do enough of on the big screen.
There is another man in her life in Dean Martin, but how he figures in you have to see What A Way To Go. This was the farewell film appearance for both Margaret Dumont who played Shirley’s mother and for Tom Conway who had a bit role.
What A Way To Go still retains a lot of the good humor for today’s audiences. I could see a remake of it with someone like Julia Roberts being married to Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, etc. They’d have to go some to replace a dancer like Gene Kelly though.
Her first love, in their dusty little town, is the hapless Dick Van Dyke who is perfectly content to spend his time fishing and reading Thoreau, while the arrogant Dean Martin lords it over Van Dyke and everyone else. MacClaine chooses to marry Van Dyke, perhaps partly because he’s so abjectly mired in poverty, just to frustrate her mother who has advised her that «money is the root of all.» Van Dyke suffers a road-to-Damascus experience and builts his shabby hardware store into a monstrously successful supermarket, then drops dead from the effort, leaving MacClaine a mountain of money. The pattern holds through her subsequent marriages.
Well, I suppose Mitchum doesn’t start out poor. He starts out fabulously wealthy, a Howard Hughes figure, distant and stern. But he warms to MacClaine, sells off his business enterprises and retires to a little farm with her. He celebrates his retirement with a few hayseed neighbors, gets a little drunk, and tries to milk the bull instead of the cow. «Melrose! FORGIVE ME!», he howls before being kicked for a field goal. He leaves her millions.
In some ways the funniest and most satiric episode involves Newman as a Paris taxi driver who is an insane painter filled with contempt for bourgeois morality and greed. He lives in a shabby studio apartment in which a dozen large crane-like arms with paint brushes on the ends are activated by his «sonic palette.» Newman bangs drums, operates jack hammers, and makes other random noises and the brushes slap away randomly at a large canvas. The painting are worth nothing. However, MacClaine accidentally activates the brushes by playing a record of Mendelssohn’s «Spring Song.» Newman has an epiphany while gawking at the brushes now oscillating in harmony. He now begins to produce machine-processed painting by playing classical music and jazz. They’re no longer «his» work, although he runs around in a frenzy with a conductor’s baton. The value of his paintings soars. They soar even more after the machines conspire to beat him to death. I can only think of one other movie, «The Prize», in which Newman has been in the least funny, fine dramatic actor that he is. He throws himself into the role of mad artist with amazing gusto.
I guess I won’t go on with this because, as must be evident, the plot has a lot of characters and is a mosaic of sub-plots. Let me add that, in some prints, in a scene in which MacClaine and Mitchum enter a ballroom in evening clothes, she does a pirouette and drops to her knees, at which point her bodice slips a little, but just enough. I only add that for the pre-verts among us. There was no joy in it for me. I’ve never had an impure thought.
I could easily see how someone might either really like this movie or hate it, as it definitely is for a niche audience. When I was a kid, I saw it and loved it—as most kids would probably enjoy this movie. However, when I saw it as an adult, it only was mildly interesting and I realized just how broad and over-the-top the humor actually was. If you can enjoy this sort of unsophistication (this is NOT meant as an insult—I can enjoy some very low-brow movies if I’m in the right mood), then I advise you to give it a try. If you love Shakespeare, Truffaut, Russian art films and Niles Crane is your role model, then please don’t expose yourself to this film.
The broadly played film stars Shirley MacLaine as apparently irresistible woman. That’s because husband after husband keep dying accidentally (it’s their own fault, really—she isn’t a serial killer) in some of the funniest ways and the movie, at times, is pure slapstick. Plus, if you hate Dick Van Dyke, Gene Kelly, Robert Mitchum or Paul Newman, then at least you get to see them die in the film!
They don’t make them like this anymore, no flashy effects to help the film along.
Great script, great character work by everyone in the film. While the cavalcade of stars in this film is rather impressive that does not always translate into a great film.
This movie manages to make it all work though. Sets are designed to give the viewer more of a live theater type of appeal which helps to keep the storyline as the main focus.
This deserves to be on DVD and definitely would be worth the buy, Yet sadly is not available. If you get a chance to see this on TV or anywhere else, it’s worth the watch
Louisa May Foster is a modest and unassuming woman. She knows just what she wants : a little house and a happy marriage with a man who shares her liking for the simple, uncluttered life. Sadly, this inoffensive life ambition is difficult to fullfil. Poor Louisa is to encounter a succession of ever more ambitious and driven men.
Enjoyable black comedy with a fine performance by lead actress Shirley MacLaine. The movie is also notable for its stellar cast and its many references (under the form of pastiches and parodies) to other films and film genres. Poor/rich Louisa tells her life story to a psychiatrist and many of her explanations turn into pastiches : there’s a «silent comedy» sequence, a «Gene Kelly musical» sequence, and so on. My personal favorite is the «Lush Budgett» sequence, where Shirley MacLaine, evolving in the world of the super-super-rich, wears ever more expensive and outlandish costumes. There’s many a clever dig at movie costumes and movie costume-making here.
The main target of the movie is, of course, the dark side of the American Dream : work, work harder, pour all your energy into your work, become a captain of industry and die young of a heart attack, estranged from family and friends. As a result the movie is required viewing for all workaholics, both potential and actual.
«What a Way to Go!» doesn’t just boast a string of «big names» in FRONT of the camera. It was directed by J. Lee Thompson, a filmmaker of great versatility, it would seem, who had recently helmed two superb action thrillers—«The Guns of Navarone» and «Cape Fear»—and now proved himself equally adept at comedy; featured music by the great Nelson Riddle, whose «Route 66» theme song was still something of a sensation; sported typically fine cinematography from Leon Shamroy, Jr., striking hairstyles from Sydney Guilaroff, jewelry from Harry Winston and costumes by the legendary Edith Head (by my rough count, Shirley changes costume 50 times in the film, and some of Head’s gowns are eye-poppingly spectacular); and, most importantly, perhaps, showcased another sparkling script from Betty Comden and Adolph Green, who had previously been responsible for such masterpieces as «On the Town,» «Singin’ in the Rain,» «It’s Always Fair Weather» (yes, all with Kelly) and «The Band Wagon.» With such an array of actors and filmmakers, a successful product was practically assured, and happily, such indeed is the case here. Consistently hilarious and imaginative from beginning to end, the film really is pure entertainment. Most impressive, perhaps, are the four imagined cinematic interludes with which Louisa describes her four marriages: a black-and-white silent film for Hopper, a French film for her Parisian artist (Newman, by the way, is very amusing here; one almost wishes that this great dramatic actor had ventured into comedy more often!), a superlush Hollywood production for the magnate, and a spectacular Broadway megamusical (choreographed by Kelly) for the vaudevillian.
There aren’t many films made in which a leading lady has half a dozen leading men to play opposite her. But, Shirley MacLaine has the honors in this film, «What a Way to Go.» Louisa May Foster goes from one man to another in marriage, only because each one dies. All the deaths happen in the pursuit of or because of each man’s wealth, riches and power. And, that’s one of the topics that this film pokes fun at, spoofs and lampoons.
There are many subjects that get a good going over with comedy and satire. Art, especially modern art gets a not so subtle bashing. The easy, simple life gets a somewhat less ridiculing than the life of riches, greed, power and endless work. The movies and Hollywood get a good mocking, mostly in fantasy daydream sequences. Fans get their fair share of ridicule, and movie stars take it on the chin. Psychiatry is knocked as is the Internal Revenue Service. High society and the aristocracy of blue bloods get a little knocking. And, business competition and consumerism get no respect.
MacLaine does some of the funny stuff and has some of the humor in the dialog. But most of both are provided by her male co-stars, all of whom were leading men of Hollywood. Taken in order, they are Dean Martin as Leonard Crawley, Dick Van Dyke as Edgar Hopper and Paul Newman as Larry Flint. Then come Robert Mitchum as Rod Anderson, Gene Kelly as Pinky Benson and Robert Cummings as Dr. Victor Stephanson. The only one Louisa doesn’t marry is Stephanson.
But MacLaine is the main character around whom the plot is built. As Louisa May Foster, she just wants a happy, simple married life. She soon thinks she is bewitched because her men all become wealthy, remote and die in their success. At one time her name in the film is Louisa May Foster Hopper Flint. Reflecting her rise in society after that, it is Louisa May Hop-Fli Anderson Benson. The writers were having fun at every turn in this film. MacLaine has lush wardrobes in the fantasy dream sequences she has with her men. And she struts and portrays her feminine wares in romantic love dream scenes in Paris.
This movie has quite a colorful past on its own, with different performers for some of the roles. Some of the scenes are mildly funny, but the best thing about the film is the script. It’s loaded with witty, corny and very funny dialog throughout.
Here are some favorite lines from the movie. For more dialog see the Quotes section under this IMDb Web page of the movie.
Dr. Victor Stephanson, «You don’t need a psychiatrist. You need your head examined.»
Leonard Crawley, «By the way, she couldn’t be your real mother. She must’ve been left on your front doorstep one stormy night, in a cage.»
Edgar Hopper, «Oh, Louisa. I’ll make you happy. I’ll never work hard. I’ll never make good, I swear it.»
Edgar Hopper, on the phone, «What is with our order on the Mother Goose Atomic Disintegrator kit?»
Larry Flint, «Money corrupts. Art erupts.» Louisa May Foster, «Oh, that’s a beautiful saying.» Larry Flint, «It’s immortal. I just made it up.»
Woman at Flint’s art show, «If only Beethoven were alive to just hear this painting.» Larry Flint, «Ah, yes. Pauvre Ludwig. I think he’d be very pleased.»
Louisa May Foster, «Well, a tycoon’s work is never finished, is it? That’s what you call yourself, isn’t it? A tycoon?» Rod Anderson, «Absolutely! Absolutely! Every morning I get up and look at myself in the mirror, and I say, ‘Good morning, tycoon!'»
Nicky Cathcart, «I do hope the two of you can come down to us for a shoot.» Louisa May Foster, «Mmm. Love to. We always get a bang out of a shoot.»
Rod Anderson, «I’m reminding you to remind me to tell you that I love you.» Louisa May Foster, «Thank you for reminding me. I’m reminding you that you said to remind me to tell me that you love me.» (sic) Rod Anderson, «Thank you for reminding me.» Louisa, «Thank you.»
TV Announcer, «Tonight, in ‘Flaming Lips,’ Pinky Benson proved that a comedy can run five and a half hours. Earlier today, Pinky told us his next film will run seven and a half hours.» Pinky Benson, «I can’t let ’em down. After all, I’m the stuff their dreams are made of. I belong to them.»
Так держать! (1964)
Актеры
Так держать!
What a Way to Go!
Бюджет:
Сборы в США:Мировые сборы:
Мировая премьера:
Возраст:
Длительность:
