Classics: The Apartment

For many, The Apartment is the best Christmas movie of all time. The colorless office clerk C.C. Baxter (Jack Lemmon) has little prestige at the insurance company he works for. To get ahead, he tries to curry favor with his superiors: he lends them his apartment so they can have their extramarital adventures there. While they enjoy themselves, Baxter wanders the streets alone around Christmas time. Baxter must choose between his ambitions and feelings when the woman with whom he is secretly in love, the elevator girl Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine), turns out to be the mistress of his top boss.

Wilder, who himself has always maintained that he made nothing but entertainment, often incorporated into his films themes of neuroses and sexual frustrations caused by hectic life in a dehumanized society. However, Wilder coupled this with melodrama, satire and humor. Thus, The Apartment is not only a film about morally questionable behavior, it is also a romantic comedy about two lonely souls who find each other. It is precisely this combination that made his films beloved by the general public, and by critics, as evidenced by the many awards he received during his career, including six Oscars.

In 1960, The Apartment received five Oscars, including in the categories of Best Screenplay, Best Direction and Best Picture. For Jack Lemmon, who had been working as an actor for more than a decade, the role in The Apartment marked his final breakthrough. Shirley MacLaine received her second Oscar nomination for her role. In 1963, she again worked with Billy Wilder and Jack Lemmon in Irma la Douce (1963) and she also received an Oscar nomination for this role.