PILLOW TALK (1959) ** Hollywood was trying to get out from under the stifling censorship it had suffered since the inception of the cinematic era, or thereabouts. It's strange to think that this was ever considered particularly racy, indisputable evidence that the social revolution has been a success even if Utopia is a slow train coming. Rock Hudson is a casanova whose conquests are all so deplorably nondescript that he finds Doris Day somehow electrifying. The writers skip a lot of even less interesting turf, and may have deserved their Oscar for figuring out how to pace something like this at all. The academy was probably more impressed with their multi-level double entendres, and misdirection towards multiple misunderstanding. Most moving of all is probably when Rock (pretending to be someone else, kind of) tries to convince Doris that he (Rock's first character) might be gay, a thought so unspeakable that she informs him that he's “sick” for even considering the possibility. Not many have played the playboy as effectively, you have to give him credit for his acting ability, not just his looks. Joan Crawford's said to have seduced him by suggesting “Pretend I'm Clark Gable.” Whatever, just because the freedom train's comin' don't mean it's turnin' the nearest corner. Some day everyone will be free, and it's worth noting that it wasn't that long ago that even a film like this was a step in the right direction.
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