Adultery Is Awesome!

... in movies, that is! Adultery is not awesome in real life, as we know from the Bible and other sources. But I fooled you with my controversial headline! In fact, my headline may be too "racy" for the "blog," and I may be overwhelmed with guilt and delete it soon, so enjoy it while you can. Perhaps I will sell or trade it to another "blog," because I have noticed that some other "blogs" are as "racy" as "all get out"! Some of them are about people who are very, very angry at particular celebrities or magazines who have hurt their feelings by existing. That's today's "blogging" tip: It's good to blow off steam! But our "blog" hasn't really trafficked in "racy" headlines, so we're still a little shy about it. By coincidence, the last three movies we have seen are about adultery: THEY ALL LAUGHED by Peter Bogdanovich, HOW TO SAVE A MARRIAGE AND RUIN YOUR LIFE (yes, we took McNeil's recommendation to heart), and THE FACTS OF LIFE, which just now aired on TCM, starring Bob Hope and Lucille Ball in charmingly understated semi-serious roles. In the midst of all those, I also managed to watch THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL for an article I'm writing about Dick Powell. Another coincidence: his section of that film has a little adultery in it, too. The former three, though, are comedies, and that seems to be the way that the movies like to handle the subject. THEY ALL LAUGHED is an extremely peculiar film - the sensibility of Hitchcock's VERTIGO somehow spliced together with Truffaut's STOLEN KISSES and maybe some Preston Sturges. I was particularly taken by two performances... those of Patti Hansen and Blaine Novak. But when I looked them up on the "internet," I was sad to see that they hadn't made too many other films. As for HOW TO SAVE A MARRIAGE, Leonard Maltin sure does give it a hard time in his movie guide. Sometimes I think Mr. Maltin and I are just not meant to be together. It's nobody's fault. Anyway, if you're looking for some fun at the movies, I suggest adultery! Uh-huh. "Gotcha" again with my "racy" implications! (Pictured, Stella Stevens, so very appealing in HOW TO SAVE A MARRIAGE AND RUIN YOUR LIFE.)