Easy to Love (1953)

Being a prop in a fancy resort is hard work. Julie (Esther Williams) and the other girls at Cypress Gardens perform many shows a day. When they're not in a show, they lounge about the grounds in fancy dresses as part of the scenery, posing for photographs and flirting with guests. As the star swimmer of Cypress Gardens, Julie's schedule is extra grueling... Here she is doing synchronized swimming in a lagoon of flower petals, when all she wants is to go out for a fun evening of her own. Or maybe spend a little time making her hard-working boss Ray (Van Johnson) jealous by going on a date with her flower petal companion.
When Julie threatens to quit because of how overworked she is, Ray offers to take her to New York. Julie thinks she has finally gotten Ray to appreciate and fall in love with her, but it turns out it's just a modeling/PR gig. Luckily for Julie, though, she meets a famous singer in New York who actively pursues her and finally makes Ray start to feel some pangs of jealousy.

Esther Williams. When did someone decide that synchronized swimming movies should be all the rage? Are there other synchronized swimming movie stars out there? In this movie, not only does Esther Williams get to float about in flower petals, but she gets to audition in a tank...
...and she performs in a water-ski extravaganza that I'm convinced defies the laws of physics.
What was possibly my favorite scene didn't even involve Esther Williams, though. It involved Julie's singer suitor singing a song called "That's What a Rainy Day is For" with a whole bunch of old ladies who must have been born in the 1800s to be so old in this movie. Cute song.

Maybe two stars. Some very entertaining stunts, but the love story was so unbelievable. I watched this with Barbara, and we kept turning to each other to say, "I don't understand why he likes her yet," or "Why does she like him?" The love story needs to be believable!!! And I don't appreciate lines like, "So you don't fight nature...You fight your wife." Sorry.

Easy to Wed (1946)

I can only hope that on the day of my wedding David and I get to perform a long song and dance number for all of our guests. In fabulous technicolor costumes.

This movie is Libeled Lady in color... Or so I think. I got this movie because it was a recommended Esther Williams movie and found out upon reading the DVD sleeve that it is in fact a re-make of Libeled Lady. After watching the trailer for Libeled Lady and reading Amy's blog post, I think it is pretty safe to say that Easy to Wed is just a remake in color...mostly the same dialogue, with a few changes: Lucille Ball for Rita Hayworth, duck hunting for angling, swimming stunts for no swimming stunts... The older movie does have William Powell and Myrna Loy, though, so I am ready to believe that it was a better movie. Now of course I very much need to see Libeled Lady to compare.
The movie starts with a slander suit. Connie Allenbury (Esther Williams) and her wealthy father are suing a newspaper for two million dollars for publishing an article that called Connie a husband stealer. Warren Haggerty comes up with a brilliant plan to save the paper... hire back Bill Chandler (Van Johnson), a reporter he had long ago fired and a man just sleazy enough to be willing to trick Connie Allenbury into actually stealing a husband, thus ruining her lawsuit. For Connie to actually steal a husband, though, Bill needs to be a husband. Haggerty gets his fiance, Gladys (Lucille Ball) to marry Bill so that Gladys can then discover Bill cheating on her with Connie.

Bill goes to great lengths to win the trust of Connie and her father. He even pretends to be an expert duck hunter, a lie which gets him invited for a weekend of hunting at the Allenbury cabin. While he's at the cabin, he realizes that Connie isn't actually the spoiled brat she appeared to be. She just comes across that way to protect herself after years of being harassed by men who want her for her money.
Once Connie trusts Bill, she drops her stuck-up act and...
Now Bill has a problem, though. He is actually in love with Connie and no longer wants to go through with the plan. Much hilarity ensues. Some of it involves Bill and Gladys pretending to be ducks to learn the art of duck hunting. (Long video, but fun!)

So three stars, because it really was a funny movie. One of those stars is for a scene near the beginning of the movie when Esther Williams water skis down a giant slide standing not on water skis, but on a man's back. I'm not sure I'll see it again, though. I will see Libeled Lady.