Madame croque-maris

This is a great film. Some have said it epitomizes the 1960s glamour comedies but what it cleverly does is parody them, and other film genres, through its movie dream sequences and the ridiculous and gorgeous costumes Shirley wears. It has a great cast and everyone is in top tongue in cheek form. Dick Van Dyke plays his usual neo-Marx brothers physical comedy schtick (with Margaret DuMont, no less!) at the height of his powers. Paul Newman is great playing against type as a tortured artist, a perfect sendup of Kirk Douglas' portrayal of Van Gough in *Lust for Life* (he even wears the same beard). Mitchum is suave and cool as a kind of Cash McCall gone wrong, but far more slick then Jim Garner ever was. To top it off, Gene Kelley does an incredible spot on parody of himself in the Holywood story, with iconic images taken straight from his greatest triumph *Singing in the Rain,* turned on their head and twisted into a grotesque commentary on the evils of Hollywood as opposed to its dreams and glamour. The scene where he is trampled to death by his fans holds up a hilarious mirror to the similar scene in *Singing in the Rain* where he has his clothes torn off by them. This film elevated parody to a high art form before anybody had even heard the term "post modernism!" And those gowns she wears! The best one is the one which is just a string of pearls down Shirley's sexy back (she faces away from the camera for the shole scene because she is obviously topless). They must have cost a fortune! this is obviously a film with a very Lush Bugett!

To describe WHAT A WAY TO GO as an ultra-light 1960s confection would be an understatement: frothy, foolish, and seeking no more than to be mildly entertaining, it is a classic of its kind and of its era.

The plot is episodic. When multi-millionaire Louisa May Foster tries to give away her money she finds herself slapped onto a psychiatrist's couch--where she details the story of a little girl from the wrong side of the tracks who was only interested in marrying for love. But as fate would have it, every husband she touched turned to gold, and their successes spelled finish to the marriage in no uncertain terms, with each widowhood leaving Louisa even more fabulously wealthy than before. What's a poor little rich girl to do? The charm here is in the cast and the production values. Although she offered considerably more in her most celebrated films, Shirley MacLaine had a remarkable way with light comedy, and she pulls out all the stops as the eternal widow, at times sassy, at times silly, but never less than completely watchable. Her unlikely co-stars--Dean Martin, Dick Van Dyke, Paul Newman, Robert Mitchum, Gene Kelly, Robert Cummings and (in her final film) the amazing Margaret Dumont--are also up to the task.

The humor is both obvious and sly, lampooning various rags-to-riches (or in one case riches-to-riches) stereotypes with a wink, a nod, and now and then an unexpectedly sophisticated bit of wit. The film works best when it gently mocks both itself and the more obvious cinematic conventions of its day, as when Louisa recalls each of her marriages with the words "it was like one of those movies where..." Everything from silent film to musicals gets a poke, and over-budgeted romantic blockbusters suddenly become considerably more comic than you'd ever imagine.

The production values are first rate, and to say there is always something to look at on the screen would be an understatement: they are deliberately and often deliciously over the top--and often as amusing as the performances. (The "Lush Budget" sequence, in which MacLaine changes gowns every few seconds, is particularly witty.) True, the movie is a no-brainer, but it is a fun one. Only a sour-puss could resist! Recommended.

Gary F. Taylor, aka GFT, Amazon Reviewer

A 1960's slightly dark comedy with a whole host of massive names but there is only one star, that is Shirley MacLaine, who is one of the most under-rated actresses of any generation. The main idea of the film is Shirley MacLaine's character is only interested in finding love and hates wealth, and this being a comedy, you can imagine the rest. Well acted with good humour, this is a good comedy film, though not one of MacLaine's best.

I love when I sit down to an older film and the first question I find myself asking is "Where has this movie been all my life?" What A Way to Go is the kind of silly romp I would have expected my Dad to introduce to me early in life. We've always shared a similar sense of humor, and the goofy farce that this black comedy utilizes is exactly the style he would love. In fact, I wasn't even 20 minutes in before I decided this was a DVD I'm going to loan to him before returning it to the library. I laughed, and I laughed a lot at the silly buffoonery of What a Way to Go! It has moments where it plays like a ZAZ comedy in the vein of Airplane or The Naked Gun, but years before those movies ever came around. The entire premise is hilarious in itself because it focuses entirely on a woman who DOESN'T want wealth, which flies directly in opposition to what most people would consider common sense and is diametrically opposed to your traditional Hollywood script.

What makes it even more surprising that I'd never heard of What a Way to Go, is the unbelievable cast. Shirley MacLaine acts opposite a cavalcade of legendary actors that I never would have guessed had all appeared in the same film. Each one of them lends their own unique flavor to their scenes, and I could not get enough of it. They even have several homages to different styles of cinema throughout, and I was delighted by each one. Of course, as a lover of musicals I was particularly enamored with the Gene Kelly section because he choreographed a big bombastic song-and-dance that felt straight out of a Rodgers & Hammerstein film. The story can get a little repetitive at times, which makes it so you are several steps ahead of the action waiting for the movie to catch up, but I was still laughing and enjoying myself through most of that, so it wasn't a big deal. I won't say What a Way to Go is my favorite comedy of its era, but it's a highly effective one that I will seek out again.

The premise is amusing - a woman who seeks the simple life, yet inadvertently ends up four times widowed and fabulously wealthy. There is also the charming conceit of each marriage being represented by a stylized mini film within a film. (Alas, these bits are often cut in network airings.) In the end, though, the whole thing devolves into little more than a lavish fashion parade of Edith Head's reported $500,000 worth of creations. And many a time everyone seems to be trying just a bit too hard to be amusing (except for the ever cool Robert Mitchum).

But if there is no real "there , there" cinematically, it doesn't much matter. Not every movie needs to be another "Citizen Kane". Just relax and have fun.