‘Let’s Make Love’, Revisited

Stuart Galbraith IV has reviewed Twilight Time’s Blu-Ray release of Let’s Make Love for DVD Talk.

“Marilyn Monroe’s penultimate (completed) feature, Let’s Make Love (1960) isn’t as good as it might have been but it’s also better than one might have expected.

Two labor strikes, more work on the script by Hal Kanter, and Monroe’s usual personal issues during shooting notwithstanding, the resultant film came out okay. It has many plusses and a few minuses, and Montand’s performance both helps and hurts the film; Gregory Peck would have been a far better choice.

But the picture deviates a lot from the standard 1950s Monroe vehicle, and the script and George Cukor’s direction give it a subtlety and sophistication unusual for musicals of the period. The recently released-on-Blu-ray Les Girls (1957) strains for something similar but fails badly. Let’s Make Love, by comparison, succeeds almost effortlessly, if in small ways.

Monroe, heavier here than any film before or after, is nevertheless very sexy, and far more natural and less affected than in her earlier Fox films. Apparently she wasn’t all that happy with the script that was finally settled upon, but her performance is sweet and charming, even if after all the fuss Clement is still the main character and dominates the screentime, despite her top billing.

Video & Audio

Twilight Time’s Blu-ray, licensed from Fox, presents the film in its original 2.35:1 CinemaScope aspect ratio, with 5.1 and 2.0 DTS-HD Master Audio mixes approximating the original 4-track magnetic stereo release prints. The image looks pretty good throughout, though some color tweaking seems to have been done, most obvious on the flesh tones of Monroe and others. A limited edition of 3,000 units, this offers optional English subtitles and apparently is region-free.

Extra Features

The limited supplements include a trailer and isolated music track, along with Julie Kirgo’s usual booklet essay.

Parting Thoughts

Good, generally, Let’s Make Love is Recommended.”