6th Favorite Movie - The Apartment

Make sure you have read the first post in this series ("My 50 Favorite Movies") before you read on...

A few years ago, I was reading an interview with Cameron Crowe, one of my favorite writer-directors (Almost Famous, Jerry Maguire, Say Anything, Singles). He was asked what his favorite movie was, and he said it was The Apartment. Even though I had never even heard of the movie before, I immediately rushed out and didn't just rent, but bought the DVD.

Written and directed by Billy Wilder (Some Like It Hot), The Apartment took home Best Picture at the Academy Awards in 1961. In the movie, Jack Lemmon plays an everyday white collar worker at a large office building in New York City and Shirley Maclaine plays an elevator operator in the building. Now, don't be turned off to the movie because of Shirley "The Psychic Friend" Maclaine, because she is very charming in this movie. Lemmon's character is trying to work his way up in the office world, and he has a hard time saying no to his bosses who constantly ask to borrow his apartment to rendezvous with their mistresses. One of themes of the movie is assertiveness - for most of the movie Lemmon's character is a pushover and lets people walk all over him. But twice toward the end of the movie he finally works up some courage and risks telling people exactly how he feels in a very appropriate way. I guess that theme has some appeal to me.

Another theme in the movie that I enjoy is the struggle between ambition vs. integrity. At first, Lemmon is so focused on getting promoted that he doesn't care about his bosses using his apartment for their extra-marital affairs. Later on though, he has a change of heart, an "awakening" much like Jerry Maguire does at the beginning of that film. I also find the beginning of Jerry Maguire to be very much like the beginning of The Apartment, in which a lot happens in a short amount of time and you are caught up on a lot of information very quickly.

Another similarity to a Cameron Crowe film (Bethany noticed this one) is the way the female lead character is written. Shirley Maclaine's character is similar to Penny Lane in Almost Famous in that she loves another man who does not treat her nearly as well as the leading male would, and it pains her to the point of considering suicide. Jack Lemmon plays the innocent, love-stricken, puppy dog role that Patrick Fugit had in Almost Famous who takes care of the smitten lady while secretly pining for her.

"Romantic-comedy" would be the best way to classify this movie I suppose, but there are also elements of drama in it. While it is certainly feels similar to many Cameron Crowe movies, I also think the ending of When Harry Met Sally, in which Harry is running on New Yea's Eve in New York to be with Sally, is borrowed from this movie. As you can tell, this movie continues to be highly influential in cinema today and if you have not seen it before, rush out and don't just rent, but buy the DVD.