Howard Hawks's Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953); Frank Tashlin's Artists and Models (1955)

Of all Hawks's films Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is the one most flawed by discrepancies between Hawks's daring originality and the "safe" conventions of a commercially orientated industry.
--Robin Wood, Howard Hawks (Doubleday, 1968)

The merriment Tashlin derives from sex, missiles, teenagers, espionage, brassieres, corruption and all the lesser problems of our times, reveals a zestful enjoyment of living.
--Ian Cameron, Frank Tashlin (Vineyard Press, 1973).

The Hawks film and the Tashlin film have some interesting things in common, including some of the same actors in minor roles (Steven Geray as a hotel manager in Hawks and a scientist in the Tashlin and, especially, George Winslow as an obnoxious child in both films), choreography for non-dancers and a double wedding at the end.  But Hawks's movie did not fully engage Hawks (he had nothing to do with the musical numbers, choregraphed by Jack Cole), while Tashlin's film shows a non-stop inventiveness and a passion for the bright colors of the fifties. I think many modern viewers also have problems with the actors in these films, especially Jerry Lewis in the Tashlin and Marilyn Monroe in the Hawks.  Hawks had used Monroe in a small part in Monkey Business (1952) but he seemed to prefer Jane Russell in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes; she was more of the strong and independent woman that Hawks liked.  Monroe is a misunderstood actress of the fifties, who reminds me of the great African-American actor Stepin Fetchit:  both are pretending to be stereotypes of gender (Monroe) or race (Fetchit) in order to use their hidden intelligence to get what they want. 

Artists and Models was the first of seven films that Tashlin directed with Lewis (I wrote about The Disorderly Orderly on April 11, 2014 and Rock-A-Bye Baby on Oct. 22, 2015)and in this case one of Lewis's last films with Dean Martin.  This film indicates how effective a team Lewis and Martin might have been with good directors, instead of the mediocre directors they had with the penny-pinching producer Hal Wallis (the Lewis/Martin films were always extremely successful commercially).  Although there is a relatively small role for Anita Ekberg in Artists and Models (the film starts with Lewis and Martin crawling into her mouth on a billboard!) there is little of the American obsession with large breasts that Tashlin so brilliantly satirized in his films with Jayne Mansfield (The Girl Can't Help It,1956 and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter,1957).  Instead Tashlin makes fun of both comic books (a comic book editor insists on more blood, more stranglings and decapitations) and those who criticize comic books (led by the sleazy Art Baker), while his female stars, Shirley MacLaine and Dorothy Malone, are working women struggling in New York.
Tashlin and his cinematographer Daniel Fapp carefully controlled the rich color on this film, Lewis being associated with pastels while the hotter and more passionate Dean Martin is associated with primary colors. 

Those who make fun of French critics because of their fondness for Jerry Lewis tend to forget (if they ever knew) that it took French writers to appreciate the visual intelligence of many great American directors, whose films Americans tended to listen to rather than actually look at.  Lewis's films --the ones he directed himself -- are full of inventive gags and have a masterly visual style that he largely learned from Tashlin.  Perhaps Lewis will be appreciated after he's dead (he just turned 90) in the way that John Wayne is now appreciated, especially for his roles with John Ford and Howard Hawks, as the knowledge of his political positions is fading.

A couple more comments on Gentleman Prefer Blondes and Hawks.  When I was much younger I loved Hawks's films for their stoic professionalism, especially in Only Angels Have Wings (1939), the first Hawks film I saw.  When I became older, married with children, I found Hawks's attitude a sign of insecurity and a lack of passion and I was much more engaged by the films of John Ford and the importance of family and tradition.  But by the time of El Dorado (1966) and Rio Lobo (1970) Hawks was contemplating mortality and willing to face the fact that we all have our weaknesses, no matter how much we are able to maintain a façade of professionalism.  And a kind word for Jane Russell, a strong woman whom Hawks should have used more.  Howard Hughes treated her like a freak but she had an impressive career nonetheless; my favorite of her movies is Raoul Walsh's The Revolt of Mamie Stover (1956), the best of her roles as a strong and independent woman.