Bus Stop [PG]

Bo Decker is the finest upcoming cattle hustler and rodeo king there is. But growing up on the ranch, there’re a lot of things he doesn’t know about. The biggest being gals. On the bus ride to a national rodeo, his buddy Virg says it’s time he found himself a gal. And that’s just what he does. First night in town, Beau falls in love with Cherie, a saloon singer, and he sets his sights on marrying her and taking her away to Montana and his ranch, whether she wants to or not. 

It’s ‘men are from Mars and women are from Venus’, all humorously set out in the West. Playing on the stereotypes of the meat headed, unrefined cowboy and the faux (almost bogan) glamour of the saloon chanteuse, Bus Stop is an odd little romantic comedy that pushes the boundaries, at times quite literally, between sexes, classes, lifestyles, and attitudes towards it all. Though most of the time annoying rather than ha-ha funny, there is nonetheless something compelling about this movie that makes you not notice that an hour and a half has gone by. 

The heightened caricatures of these stereotyped characters are what allow Bus Stop to get away with some of the things that it does. Technically, we talking about a movie where meat headed bully, and misogynist at that, becomes infatuated with a girl and abducts her. 

The character of Beau, a rather ironic one when you consider that he’s got ‘regard’ in his name, is really shocking from the beginning of the film, right through the climax. It literally takes a beating in the snow to cool this cowboy down. Don Murray played the role really well; he was loud, aggressive, and a real dumb pretty boy with a lasso, but after he’d had his little serving of humble pie he was sweet and amorous and soft-spoken and charming. Really nice, and you’re quick to forgive him. 

Marilyn Monroe is Cherie and whilst she’s armed with a slightly brighter intellect than her male counterpart, she’s still a delightful little ditz with just an amazingly amorous and irresistible face. There’s a lot of sex going on in that face of hers in this flick, and I have to admit that it really is enchanting. Even when she’s got drool coming from one side from sleeping with her mouth open and complainingly arguing to be left alone (in a screech that could crack glass I might add), she’s still so sexy. This is why I adore Marilyn! 

Starring Arthur O’Connell, Betty Field, Eileen Heckart, Robert Bray, Hope Lange, Hans Conried and Max Showalter, Bus Stop is a strangely compelling little romantic comedy that gets saved as a movie by its slightly screwball genre. Whilst the events push the boundaries, the genre and the exaggerated characters allow it get away from the repercussions relatively unscathed and by the end of the flick, you’re smiling sheepishly and cooingly with the rest of the cast. Filled with action, drama, romance, misinterpretations, and comedy, it’s a flick that I can’t say I loved, but I did enjoy.