Romancefest 3: Sadiefest - Guys and Dolls

GUYS AND DOLLS is one of those musicals I always heard about but never really saw. I couldn’t have even told you which famous songs come from this musical, but now I know the only one I really recognized was “Luck Be a Lady.” And guess what? Sinatra doesn’t even sing it! As unlikely as it might seem, Marlon Brando gets to belt out this gem.

The film stars Brando and Sinatra as a couple of gamblers hanging out in Times Square. Sinatra’s secretly running a “floating” craps game, hiding it from both his long-time showgirl fiancé (Vivian Blaine) and his cop arch nemesis (Robert Keith). The story starts with Sinatra desperate to raise some money to fund the game, and he sees Brando as his mark. Unfortunately, Brando is a slightly more successful gambler than Sinatra, and is always one step ahead, until Sinatra plays on his weakness – women.

Soon, the two have a bet: Sinatra bets Brando can’t take just any woman on his upcoming trip to Havana. Brand bets he can. The catch: Sinatra gets to pick the woman, and she turns out to be the morally self-righteous head missionary of the local mission (Jean Simmons). She’s cute enough, but not at all interested in gambling, drinking, or going to Havana with a strange man.

Since we’ve all seen this basic plot many times since GUYS AND DOLLS (and probably before it, too) it will come as no surprise that Brando successfully dupes and then falls in love with Simmons. Meanwhile, it will also come as no surprise that Sinatra overcomes his fear of commitment and marries the long suffering Blaine. So, really, the only thing left to interest the audience is the movie’s style.

Thankfully, the movie has plenty of style to go around, from the impressionistic Times Square and Havana sets to the wild costume design – a fusion of depression era gangsters and molls and then-contemporary cutting edge fashion. We’ve also got two leads with plenty of flair, Sinatra and Brando, one better suited for a musical than the other but both well suited for their con-man roles. Brando is fascinating to watch as he seduces Simmons and Sinatra is plenty funny and sympathetic as the put-upon gambler. The leading ladies are also well cast, with Blaine coming straight from Broadway with a comedic performance that seems to predict the likes of Madeline Kahn, and Simmons making the most of a somewhat thankless role, especially in the Havana scenes when she can really open up.

The main problem with GUYS AND DOLLS is that it gets bogged down in its own paint by numbers plot. The movie runs long at 2 hours and 30 minutes. This isn’t so bad when it’s exploring the relationships between the characters or indulging in musical numbers, but gets a little annoying when we’re forced to sit through obligatory ups and downs that are still happening 2 hours into the flick. I guess this was at the height of the cinema’s attempts to avoid being destroyed by television, so long-form entertainment was deemed appropriate not only for stories with an epic scope but also for more lightweight fare like romantic musical comedies.