Artists and Models
Screening on Film
Directed by Frank Tashlin .
With With Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Shirley MacLaine.
US, 1956, 35mm, color, 109 min.
Print source: Paramount Pictures
With With Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Shirley MacLaine.
US, 1956, 35mm, color, 109 min.
Print source: Paramount Pictures
Like Federico Fellini, Frank Tashlin turned from drawing comic strips to feature film making. Here he pays homage to his roots in this vehicle for the comedy team of Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin. In creating the best of the duo’s star vehicles, Tashlin also provides plentiful examples of the kinds of dazzling and outlandish visuals that earned him the admiration of Godard and a reputation as a precursor of Pop art. The plot creates rich comic satire out of the early 1950s concern that comic books were ruining the minds of a generation of young adults, with Lewis playing a would-be author driven to hysterics of fear and desire by his beloved Bat Lady comics.