🎬 What I’m watching: The Apartment
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (out of 5)
This review contains spoilers.
The Apartment (1960, dir. Billy Wilder) tells the story of a low-ranking insurance employee named Mr. C. C. “Bud” Baxter (Jack Lemmon) whose conveniently located New York apartment attracts the attention of executives who wish to use it as a discreet location for their extramarital affairs. We watch Bud roam the streets late at night as he is kicked out of his apartment, an arrangement he agrees to in exchange for a promotion in the office.
Eventually we’re introduced to the object of his affections, an elevator operator named Ms. Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine), who (unbeknownst to Bud) is having an affair with Bud’s new boss, Jeff Sheldrake (Fred MacMurray). After the company Christmas Eve party, Jeff brings Fran to Bud’s apartment and torments her by revealing that he has yet to leave his wife. Heartbroken and abandoned, Fran takes an overdose of sleeping pills and waits for death in Bud’s bed. Drama ensues.
What I liked most about this movie was the development of Bud’s character as a “nice guy.” He evolves from a passive, unquestioning man who allows his morally repugnant superiors to take advantage of him to a responsible caretaker who witnesses the damage (Fran‘s attempted suicide) resulting from his passivity.
I also really appreciated the dynamic between his character and Fran‘s, as they bond over heartbreak and self-harm despite occupying very different roles as men and women in the 1960s. Bud demonstrates his capacity for empathy when he speaks to Fran as a peer, sharing his own humiliating experience with attempted suicide. In addition, he abandons his insurance career after his boss showcases his continual narcissism and disregard for Fran’s humanity.
I have a lot of frustrating personal experience with people like Bud (passive, unassuming, nonconfrontational) and it’s heartwarming to see a representation of one possible mode of personal development.