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Rating: 4.75 out of 5
I have lived a great majority of my life in an apartment. When you live in a major city, you bet your ass you will live in an apartment. You can have many choices of what you are looking for. You can live in a studio, one-or two-bedroom apartment. You can have roommates to help with rent because it will be a major expense. Hopefully, you can get a house later on in life. Here is a question. Would you ever lend your apartment to someone? Would you lend it to someone who can use it to get some action so you can climb the corporate ladder? I have an entertaining movie about a person who lets others use his apartment.
Directed and produced by Billy Wilder from a screenplay he co-wrote with I. A. L. Diamond., the Apartment follows an insurance clerk trying to climb the corporate ladder and lets some senior executives use his Upper West Side apartment to conduct extramarital affairs. C.C. “Bud” Baxter (Lemmon) is a mild-mannered, hard-working insurance employee working for Consolidated Life. Bud has been working at the company for nearly four years and is one of the thousands of employees in the Manhattan head office. Bud’s goal is to climb the corporate ladder. He tries to stand out among the others by working late but also giving up his apartment to a handful of company executives: Eichelberger, Vanderhoff, Kirkeby, and Dobisch on a rotating basis for their extramarital liaisons in return for a good word to the personnel director. When Bud is called into Sheldrake’s office for the first time, he believes he will get a promotion. He doesn’t expect that Sheldrake wants to be added to the list of people who want to use his apartment. Tensions rise as everyone’s schedule becomes off-balanced. To make matters worse, Bud has a major crush on Fran Kubelik (MacLaine), an elevator operator in the office building. When Bud is about to ask her out, he learns that she is one of the women that is part of the extramarital affairs. What will Bud do with all this drama in his life?
Honestly, I wasn’t expecting the story of this film. You know what? It was damn good and entertaining. Holy shit, do I love those classic, black and white movies. They always have a great story, great cast, and none of that over-the-top special effects/CGI. This story works so well because the main character, C.C. “Bud” Baxter, is quite relatable to many people. Homeboy works in an insurance office and wants to climb up that corporate ladder. Rather than sleeping his way up to the top, which is quite hard since all the bosses are men, homeboy does the unthinkable. He loans his apartment out to his bosses so they can have affairs. He simply doesn’t just give his apartment up; he makes sure they have food and plenty of alcohol. What happened to late night in the hotels? I give it to C.C. “Bud” Baxter; homeboy always has to clean his sheets.
You can tell his bosses have absolutely ZERO respect for him. Bud even has zero respect for himself. Yes, everyone might need a job, but to give up your personal home is crossing the line. We are not talking about one person, but up to four or five of these crummy ass dudes were sleeping in his bed. The disrespect. With Bud, I love how he sees that it’s not all that cracked up to be when he gets to the top. I love how he threw up the deuces and walked the hell out of that building after all he did.
That brings me to the second part of this story. C.C. Baxter gets no love, and the one person he has a MAJOR crush on Fran Kubelik, an elevator operator in the office building. Bud has that dorky personality to him, and Fran is a nice girl but somewhat airhead because she can’t read. How in the hell you can’t read? Bud is sweet but learns that Fran is one of the women having an affair with the head boss. The head boss treats her like trash and, after a night together, gives her $100 bucks. This girl is classy and not a hoe. Homegirl actually tries to kill herself by overdosing on pills. Bud saves her with his doctor neighbor, and she is still not interested in him. He helps her get better and even tries to teach her how to play Gin Rummy. She talks about how she can’t find a great guy, and he tells her the story of how he gets a fruitcake every year. After everything, you see how hurt Bud was until Fran realizes she likes him. The ending was so well done you have to applaud.
Jack Lemmon as Calvin Clifford (C.C.) “Bud” Baxter was fantastic! I found him dorky but funny. He thought he was so cool when he strolled around in his bowler’s hat. You saw how heartbroken he was when he found out homegirl was fooling around with the boss. Lemmon was just a fantastic person to have in this role.
Shirley MacLaine as Fran Kubelik was beautiful even if she was somewhat an airhead. She didn’t know she had a great thing with Bud. She was too busy trying to get with a married man. That sex must be great if you want his old ass. MacLaine was adorable, and I also found her fun-loving. She has a cute smile.
The Apartment is where it’s at. It is a fun-loving movie where you want the little guy to win and for the girl to truly see him as a love interest. Lemmon and MacLaine are perfect in their roles. I should learn how to play Gin Rummy. Maybe I’ll start sending people fruitcakes also. Finally, don’t lend your apartment to anyone. People being straight-up nasty in your sheets.
