Let's Make It Legal

Forty-something Claudette Colbert (she was 48 at the time) is waiting for her divorce decree to become final. She lives in a beautiful home in southern California which she shares with her married daughter and her husband (Barbara Bates, Robert Wagner). He works at a local resort hotel with his father-in-law (Macdonald Carey) who keeps coming around the house to tend his roses and talk Colbert out of the divorce. He has a gambling problem.

The daughter (Bates) is a whiny, annoying little thing who wants mommy to wait on her, cook, and help with the baby. Wagner wants to move out, but Bates wants to stay to help her parents get back together. Enter millionaire Victor (Zachary Scott), a former rival for Colbert's hand.

Scott is about to land a big government appointment and has returned to his home town for publicity and moves into the resort where Carey is PR director. Also staying there is Miss Cucamonga (Marilyn Monroe), who's out for all the publicity she can get.

Of course Scott ignores Monroe and zeroes in on old flame Colbert, much to the annoyance of Carey. The divorce becomes final and Colbert announces she will marry Scott. Daughter Bates goes into a tizzy at the thought of losing mommy and having to set up her own home with Wagner.

What settles Colbert's mind in the matter is when she learns why Scott did not propose to her 20 years before and why Carey did. Will she really marry Scott or will she reconcile with Carey? Seems far-fetched by today's standards, but in 1951 divorce was still a big deal. The stars all do well here with Monroe notable in her "build-up" period with 20th Century-Fox. Colbert looks great though she's a decade older than her suitors.

Co-stars include Kathleen Freeman, Frank Cady, and Vici Raaf.

Bates' character is truly annoying and selfish and almost ruins the film.

The young whiny daughter pretty much ruined this movie for me. Not sure why Marilyn Monroe was even in this picture. It was fun seeing Robert Wagner when he was twenty. Now he's 90 and still looks good. The story was so so.

It's the 50's: everyone is dressed up at work and at home, pitchers of dry martinis are the order of the day, and liberal use of DDT is the best bet for killing aphids on roses. You can't help but smile at some of this stuff. There's nothing terribly amazing about the script in this romantic comedy, which has a couple (Claudette Colbert and Macdonald Carey) divorcing after 20 years of marriage, and a jet-setter and old flame (Zachary Scott) swooping in on her. What's fun is the cast - Colbert is a delight and looks fantastic at age 48, her son-in-law is played by a slender 21-year-old Robert Wagner, and a blonde fortune hunter who appears in a few scenes is played by 25-year-old Marilyn Monroe, right before she became mega-famous. It's light entertainment with a cutesy ending.

Pretty straightforward romantic comedy from the 1950's starring the wonderful Claudette Colbert and the new to me Macdonald Carey. They play Miriam and Hugh Halsworth who are in the process of getting a divorce. Miriam is still living in the family's home with their daughter, son-in-law and new born granddaughter. I was delighted to see Robert Wagner as the son-in-law who played off Barbara Bates who played his young wife. Another delightful surprise is the young Marilyn Monroe, who plays a bit part as a side character...I feel like she was under used in this film as a distraction.

A large part of the comedy is around Hugh constantly showing up uninvited to the family home...and his concern over his garden roses that at one point he shows up at night to move! Their divorce is proceeding when their high school friend and Miriam's former boyfriend shows up wanting to pursue her again...this reveals an ancient secret around some dice used to win Miriam.

Claudette Colbert is the best part of this film and if you are a fan you just get it. Cute and fun, I think fans of early 50's romantic comedies will enjoy this. The one downside is the whole divorce storyline. I hate the normalization of divorce that I see in this film.

The two main male characters are both pursuing and fighting over the older woman (Claudette Colbert) and ignoring the charms of the young bombshell (Marilyn Monroe)! Surely that is a progressive and unusual story line for 1951, maybe for any era. Colbert and the two men do fine work, and Monroe looks great and does a few funny physical bits in her small role (it is absurd that the DVD is promoted as a Marilyn Monroe movie). Great period costumes, decor and language, too. This is an entertaining, sometimes funny '50s film with a strangely progressive bent, a strong older-woman lead, and some interesting character quirks (how can you not love a guy whose passions are horse betting and rose cultivation), plus a Marilyn Monroe cameo.