Easy to Love Reviews

Between 1952 and 1953, Esther Williams released three of her best films, Million Dollar Mermaid, Dangerous When Wet, and Easy to Love, which would also be the last great starring role for her. After this, her charm fizzled, but she made sure Easy to Love hit you with a bang.

A more complicated plot than most of her films, Easy to Love sees Williams being romanced by Van Johnson, Tony Martin, and John Bromfield. Add in a story that sees her as the star of an aquatic spectacle in Florida’s Cypress Gardens, and Williams being given the chance to play something other than “wholesome,” and you’ve got the makings of a top-notch entry in her filmography.

What really sells the film as one of the better variations on her formula is the ending, once again choreographed by Busby Berkeley. This time, it’s a stunt-heavy sequence which sees Williams leading the charge on water skis. Still demonstrating tremendous grace and poise in addition to her athleticism, this is a nice variation on her normal water ballets. Instead of a chorus of back-up swimmers (dancers?) creating swirling patterns for Williams to dive in and out of, we find her leading the charge in one of her most grandiose, eccentric, and enthralling numbers yet.

Normally a bit of a doormat in her movies, a nasty sign of the times has Williams continuously finding herself in love triangles in which she mindlessly gets passed back and forth, the recipient of the action instead of an active participant. A scene where she gets drunk and takes it out on Johnson is particularly pleasing, it’s nice to see Williams finally gain some agency and snap back.

Throw in some musical numbers from Tony Martin, John Bromfield’s beefy, hunky body on display (he and Williams engage in a particularly erotic and strange flirtation in a pool of floating flowers), and the numerous aquatic spectacles, and what you have here is distillation of brash movie making at its finest. This is pure escapism, in which the plot is the thin connective tissue between the big-bang-for-your-buck entertainments. It works like gangbusters, it is silly nonsense, but it’s gloriously silly nonsense.