Sex and the Single Girl (1964)

Simply Perfect

Don't Believe the Hype

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

There is something infectious about this comedy. The cast is about as perfect as you can get, but the subject matter was a bit awkward when compared to today's mores.Before Carrie Bradshaw there was Helen Gurley Brown (Natalie Wood) a real life psychologist and businesswoman (she was editor of Cosmo for 32 years). Ms. Brown has just written a very controversial book about sex and the single girl (hence the title). It creates a firestorm amongst her male colleagues and her conservative patients. Tony Curtis is Bob Weston, a writer for a sleazy National Enquire-esque magazine called Stop. Bob wants to get an interview with Ms. Brown, but pretends to be a patient in need of marital counseling as a ruse. He uses his next door neighbors', Frank (Henry Fonda) and Syvia (Lauren Becall), volatile marriage as material. Of course a romance blossoms and then the normal confusion and hijinks ensue.My issue with the film is the way Ms. Brown is portrayed. She is a befuddled, confused and weak female. She's also a terrible therapist. Despite writing a book on how a single girl can be successful, she immediately allows herself to become involved with a married patient. If I was the real Helen Brown, I would be appalled. Ms. Wood is gorgeous and I'm captivated by her screen presence, but she plays Ms. Brown as a woman who needs a man...the exact opposite of the book she wrote and my recollections of Ms. Brown in real life (mostly from reading her biography). I understand this was set in the 1964 when views of male/female relationship skewed more towards male dominance, but it was still hard for me to accept that Ms. Brown could accomplish so much while being so desperate for a man...and a married one at that. Her therapy techniques violate every code of ethics you can imagine. Sure, it was a funny movie and I enjoyed it, but it left me feeling awkward at how simple women were portrayed.The supporting cast is top notch and the movie's best selling point. Fonda and Bacall as the bickering neighbors are a treat. Mel Ferrer as Brown's fellow psychologist and potential love interest is hilariously smarmy and cocky. Fran Jeffries and Leslie Parish are attractive and funny love interests/secretary for Bob. Larry Storch appears in a cameo as a motorcycle cop during the finale's odd highway chase scene. Count Basie and his orchestra are here just to provide some gravitas, but don't really play any key roles.There is a running gag about Tony Curtis wearing a woman's robe and everyone referring to him as Mr. Lemon. Curtis and Jack Lemon had starred in "Some Like It Hot" a few years before where they dressed like women. The gag was funny the first two times, but it got overplayed.I have to say something about the chase scene. It seems that every romantic comedy in the 1960s had a chase scene. This one had a funny idea of the first three cars tossing a quarter to the toll taker. The last car leaves a dollar and takes the 75 cents. It was silly, poorly filmed, but made me laugh. Then there is another similar thing involving pretzels which I simply did not understand. I'm sure there was a point, but I missed it.With this much talent, it was going to succeed and it does. I just wish Ms. Brown had been played a bit more wisely and not as such an easy mark for Tony Curtis' Bob Weston.

When Lauren Bacall died a couple of weeks ago-on the day after Robin Williams passed away-I immediately moved this title to the top of the Netflix order list. So it's now been a few hours ago that I managed to watch this with Mom. We both chuckled at a few places here and there. Overall though, I recognized this as mostly fluff that really didn't say anything about adult relationships and the complications of feelings concerning the opposite sex, just made various silly lines and scenes as distractions meant to simply entertain. It certainly was interesting seeing leads Tony Curtis and Natalie Wood flirting with each other in a farcical way like Doris Day and Rock Hudson did in their comedies. Second leads Henry Fonda and Ms. Bacall also provide some amusements. I also liked some of the sexiness of Fran Jeffries and Leslie Parish characters when they're involved with Curtis. And it was also nice seeing an old pro like Edward Everett Horton and an up-and-comer like Larry Storch in the same movie, although separately. And I'll always like the hilarious ways Curtis is always mistaken for his Some Like It Hot co-star Jack Lemmon here. The car chase was possibly too silly, though even then, there were some moments. In summary, Sex and the Single Girl wasn't great or even very good but was passably entertaining, just the same.

In 1963, It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World was the 3rd grossing film. In 1964, three Peter Sellers films were in the top 15. Is it any wonder that a studio might try to capture that madcap silliness? As it turns out, Sex and the Single Girl (SATSG) was the 20th grossing film of 1964, so they got what they wanted. And perhaps the film-going public did too.Looking back at this film now, however, does not do it any favors. Though its title might suggest a semi-serious film about liberating women from their roles and the expectations of society, SATSG is nothing like that. It is a tongue-in-cheek attempt at humor that, in the end, is nothing more than a series of gags. Unfortunately, most of what is intended as humor is rather lame and not worthy of an issue of Mad Magazine. These gags are more appropriate for an episode of The Carol Burnett Show and would have been performed better there.There's a flat joke about automats and the automation of America. A man in a frilly woman's robe. Fonda and Bacall twisting to a song that is not appropriate for twisting. Water coming out of the mouth of someone who was dunked in the ocean. The only gag that works is about two men in golfcarts chasing their balls.Accompanying this annoying attempt at humor is an insipid soundtrack, replete with rimshots and silly sound effects.This film has nothing to say. And the characters are just silly caricatures, so you can't really care about what happens to them. SATSG has a wonderful cast, totally misspent. Every actor has many quality films to his credit (except Larry Storch), so it's painful to see them in this shallow, unfunny vehicle. Consider Tony Curtis, Natalie Wood, Henry Fonda, Lauren Bacall, and Mel Ferrer.There is a nostalgic joy in seeing any of these actors in a film, but that was the extent of my interest in this film. A waste of time and talent.

I had not been a big fan of Natalie Wood but have become interested in her since meeting young Natalie who reminds me very much of the actress. So I have been seeing some of her old movies here and there. This one has been released on DVD and it is a very nice one.Tony Curtis stars as Bob Weston, the most sleazy writer for the magazine "STOP" that prides itself in sleazy reporting. He has done an article on 23-year-old single therapist, Natalie Wood as Helen Gurley Brown, who wrote the book "Sex and the Single Girl." The article went on to ridicule the young therapist by saying a young, single virgin could not be a very credible sex therapist. Quickly she found her appointments being canceled because of the article.But Bob Weston has an even grander plan, he will romance the young doctor and get enough inside information to write an even harder-hitting expose'.Bob's neighbor and friend is ladies hosiery manufacturer and sales manager Henry Fonda as Frank Broderick. Frank's wife is Lauren Bacall as Sylvia.As soon as Bob realizes that Helen knows who he is and will not let him even in the same room, he hatches a plan, he will pretend to be his neighbor, Frank, and ask for help with relationship issues between himself and his wife. But Frank and Sylvia know nothing about this.The interplay between Curtis and Wood is great, and many very funny situations result. When Helen eventually finds out what is really going on she decides to skip out to Fiji with an admiring co-worker, but Bob, Frank, and Sylvia all end up in a madcap chase scene on the Los Angeles freeway system, that also involves a cab driver, an ice cream vendor, and a motorcycle cop. It is madcap, and it is funny.Nothing in the story is plausible but it doesn't have to be. It is just a funny story with funny characters. A classic from the 1960s.