The Island Cinephile

What a Way to Go!: A dense storyline with little time

“I’ll have a–a Scotch on the rotch… uh, on the rocks.”

Louisa may foster

What a Way to Go retells the life of a four-time married and widowed Louisa May Foster, portrayed by Shirley MacLaine. We journey with her as she falls in love with different men over the course of her life, the likes of such being Dean Martin, Gene Kelly, Paul Newman, Robert Mitchum, and Dick Van Dyke. Most of the men she met – minus Martin and Mitchum — had been poor until she helped them to realize they could be successful. Once they had achieved wealth and success, their egos led them to an unfavorable end. Blaming herself and those newfound riches, MacLaine is in a state of disbelief and near hysteria for the entire film as she recounts these tragedies. 

Beginning with a few laughs to boot and a promising story, its successes are short-lived the longer the movie runs. An increasingly thin plot clashes with the dense material of the script resulting in a prolonged watch. There were too many husbands with too many stories which ran the film into being more of a chore to complete than a cinematic experience.  With beautifully shot scenes and lovely montages of the married life before the men met their demise, the use of technicolor aided in visual aesthetics. Her outfits were beautiful and made its mark in the fashion communities. What a Way to Go was quite an adventure but not one that would be considerably groundbreaking. 

Watch trailer for What a Way to Go!.