FILM: The Seven-Year Itch (1955)

"These films are classic for a reason," I exclaimed at the end of The Seven-Year Itch. "Why don't people watch them more?" If you're looking for brainy comedy with a heaping dose of somehow-innocent titillation, look no further. There is much more to The Seven-Year Itch than the famous scene where Marilyn Monroe's skirt blows upward over a subway grate. The many who enjoy the sitcom "Scrubs" may agree with me that one precursor of its madcap daydream sequences is found here. Music snobs with a sense of humor might be charmed by Marilyn's response when the hero carefully selects Rachmaninoff's 2nd Piano Concerto with the aim to seduce. There are also entertaining literary references, e.g. to Dorian Gray; self-referential mockery; and an unremitting series of one-liners which made me want to obtain a copy of the script (a psychiatrist, nonchalantly, on why he arrived ahead of schedule: "My 3:00 patient jumped out of the window in the middle of his session and I've been running 15 minutes early ever since"). The ending is perfectly poised between sentiment and realism. And how not to cheer for a protagonist whose downfall is his runaway romantic imagination?