Some Like It Hot

directed by Billy Wilder

starring Jack Lemmon, Tony

Curtis and Marilyn Monroe

April 29 at 7pm

at the Harvard Film Archive

Missing

directed by Constantine Costa-Gavras

starring Jack Lemmon, Sissy

Spacek and Melanie Mayron

April 30 at 7pm

at the Harvard Film Archive

This weekend Jack Lemmon '47 returns to his alma mater; and Harvard has prepared the fatted calf for him. As part of the third annual Arts First festivities, Lemmon will receive the first Harvard Arts Medal, an award meant for "a distinguished Harvard or Radcliffe graduate or faculty member who has made an outstanding contribution to the arts." Lemmon will also be the subject of a tribute at the Harvard Film Archive, which will show four of Lemmon's representative films.

1959's "Some Like It Hot," a gangster-era comedy directed by Billy Wilder and scripted by Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond, features Lemmon's best performance ever. Lemmon and co-star Tony Curtis play a pair of Chicago musicians who witness the infamous St. Valentine's Day Massacre. The Mob wants the two permanently silenced and the musicians decide to leave Chicago any way they can.

With frilly frocks, cloche hats and new names--Curtis becomes 'Josephine,' and Lemmon 'Daphne'--in place, they join an all girl band with a gig in far-away Florida. This is no ordinary all-girl band, for it features Marilyn Monroe, at her ripest and most Iuscious, as Sugar Kane, a chanteuse and clarinet player with a weakness for liquor and rakes.

It isn't long before Josephine is taking on another role, this time as a dashing, impotent millionaire, in order to conquer Sugar. In his millionaire act, Curtis does a wickedly funny parody of Cary Grant, and as a sensitive, emasculated man he proves irresistible to Sugar. Curtis is so good in the role that it even becomes possible to forgive the slight on Cary Grant.

Meanwhile, Daphne is courted by a real millionaire (played by the great Joe E. Brown) who showers her with presents, leads her through a whirlwind romance and finally proposes marriage. (In one of the film's most infamous exchanges Josephine asks Daphne, "Why would a guy marry another guy?" Lemmon answers, "Security.")

Wilder's and Diamond's writing is crackerjack, and Wilder's direction snappy and inspired, but the success of "Some Like It Hot" rests primarily on its legendary cast. Marilyn Monroe is sweet and voluptuous, and gets to sing "I want to Be Loved by You." Curtis acquits himself with grace, especially in the millionaire bit. Joe E. Brown gives an impeccable performance, the apogee of a lifetime of acting.

The acting honors in "Some Like It Hot," however, belong to Lemmon. Wilder referred to Lemmon as a ham, and here it works to the film's advantage. Lemmon's complete surrender to his role, his willingness to look absolutely ridiculous, mirrors the comedy of the musician's giving in to the pleasures of being a woman. Daphne loves wearing the clothes, and loves the attention she gets from men; she begins to think of herself as a really sexy girl.

Lemmon's character goes from being the same and sober one of the pair--Curtis is the flamboyant, womanizing risk-taker--to a state of madcap abandon. There's a gleam in his eyes as he shakes a pair of maracas, or holds a rose between his teeth during a tango with Brown, that is nothing short of priceless. The tango scene is one of the greatest in comedy film history, and it works because of Lemmon.

Lemmon's performance in "Some Like It Hot" remains his greatest achievement. He reveals himself to be an inspired and talented comedic actor, and his work on "Some Like It Hot" is his legacy to acting.

It is unfortunate to see Lemmon--like Woody Allen and Robin Williams--become seemingly ashamed of his comedic talents, and turn to awful "serious" roles in order to get respect. Woody Allen went from making great, loopy comedies to putting out insufferable Ingmar Bergmanesque dramas, as strained as facelifts and as painful as enemas. Robin Williams turned to sentimental pabulum like "Dead Poets' Society" and "Awakenings." Lemmon turned from Billy Wilder comedies like "Some Like It Hot" to appalling pieces of work like 1973's abominable "Save the Tiger," (for which he won the Academy Award as Best Actor) and Constantine Costa-Gavras' 1982 "Missing."

In "Missing," Lemmon plays ED Horman, a conservative American businessman whose son, residing in Chile, disappears a few days after the 1973 military coup that brought General Pinochet to power. Horman travels to Chile and, along with his daughter-in-law, Beth (Sissy Spacek), tries to find out what happened to his son.

Horman has an unshakable faith in the American way and whole-heartedly disapproves of his son's and his daughter-in-law's left-wing politics and counterculture ways. However, little by little he realizes that the American authorities are giving him the run-around, and eventually discovers that the American government is almost wholly responsible for his son's disappearance and execution. Along the way to these discoveries, Horman begins to sympathize with Beth and his missing son, and comes to the conclusion that they weren't pinko flower children at all.

"Missing" is like St. Paul's trip to Damascus, when the former pagan saw the light and was converted to the truth and to Christianity. In this case, ED Horman goes to Santiago and is converted to liberalism because he sees that his government has betrayed him and the American people. This film details a man's Coming to Consciousness, and as such it is pedantic, ideological, onedimensional and utterly boring.

Costa-Gavras, who directed the superb political thriller "Z," flails about here with no sense of proportion or subtlety. Though Costa-Gavras manages some excellent atmospheric effects, everything is overstated and obvious, and the film's messages seem to be written in big letters across the actors' broad and innocent brows.

Lemmon is at the center of the film, and he brings down the entire enterprise. Dreadfully earnest and concerned, he is the virtuous, apolitical innocent with whom the audience is supposed to identify. Lemmon's performance is twitchy and insufferable. It is almost impossible to believe that this man is the same Jack Lemmon who tangoed with a rose between his teeth while dressed in a flapper's dress. What's really "Missing" here is the real Jack Lemmon.

The real Jack Lemmon, however, will be present here at Harvard over the weekend, and present in the other delightful films which from the Harvard Film Archive feature--"Some Like It Hot," "The Apartment," and "How to Murder Your Wife." Lemmon has had a distinguished career of giving pleasure to his audience, one we celebrate this weekend.