Here’s a review in New York Newsday of the new Collector’s Edition release of Billy Wilder’s Oscar-winning The Apartment. Like most reviewers, Jan Stuart loves the film (it is, apropos of nothing, our mother’s favorite movie). And he mentions Mad Men:
Surely this is where “Mad Men,” AMC’s advertising-world drama, derived its stark, fluorescent-ceiling ambience and ribald, ’60s spirit. For all its Wilderesque cynicism, “The Apartment” is rescued from that TV show’s soullessness by the waifish but unmistakably wise presence of MacLaine as elevator operator Fran Kubelik.
We here will find Stuart’s characterization of “soullessness” completely wrong-headed, but Matt Weiner confirms he’s absolutely right about the film’s influence.
The Apartment was on TCM at 3:45 Wednesday morning. I DVRed it and we’ll be reviewing it sooner or later.
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