How To Marry A Millionaire (1953)

Three models (Marilyn Monroe, Lauren Bacall, Betty Grable) pool their meager resources and rent a plush Manhattan penthouse hoping to nab millionaire husbands. Their plans don't quite work out that way. The second film in the CinemaScope format (though apparently filmed first, it was released after THE ROBE), its plot was hardly fresh even in 1953. Stories and plays about pretty young things on the hunt for rich husbands were a staple going back to the 1920s. This frothy confection is light on wit but makes up for it with its sparkling trio of comediennes, all three looking drop dead gorgeous and at the top of their comedy game. Monroe in particular stealing whole scenes as the myopic dingbat. William Powell, Rory Calhoun, David Wayne and Cameron Mitchell are the guys in their lives. Alfred Newman conducts an overture of his own STREET SCENE prior to the film proper in order to show off the then new spacious stereophonic sound. With Fred Clark and Alexander D'Arcy.