History Film / TheApartment

** Inverted with Baxter's gun. In the final scene, [[spoiler:Baxter has lost the girl, quit his job and is dejectedly moving out of apartment when we see him take out his pistol. As Fran approaches the door, we hear a loud pop, but it turns out that he's just opened a bottle of champagne, not shot himself]].

-->'''Baxter:''' You're not going to bring anybody to my apartment.
-->'''Sheldrake:''' I'm not just bringing anybody; I'm bringing Miss Kubelik.
-->'''Baxter:''' ''Especially'' not Miss Kubelik.

-->'''Sheldrake:''' What's gotten into you, Baxter?
-->'''Baxter:''' Just following doctor's orders. I've decided to become a mensch. You know what that means? A human being.

--->'''Dobisch:''' No kidding. Buddy-boy and Kubelik having themselves a little toot!
--->'''Kirkeby:''' Toot? More like a [[Film/TheLostWeekend lost weekend]]. Neither of them showed up for work today.

* UnfortunateImplications: Deliberately invoked in-universe when Sheldrake hands Miss Kubelik the money.

* CelebrityParadox: Dobisch wants to use C.C. Baxter’s apartment for date whom he says looks just like Marilyn Monroe. Director Billy Wilder's previous film,''Film/SomeLikeItHot'', starred Jack Lemmon with Marilyn Monroe.

* {{Antihero}}: Baxter is sympathetic, but he's also an ExtremeDoormat who's decided that the possibility of a promotion justifies the negative effects that the apartment scheme has on his neighbors plus his own well-being. Casting the extremely likable Creator/JackLemmon in the role tones down the less savory side of the character.

* ExecutiveExcess: All the company managers receive this treatment, with them all happily exploiting the opportunity to use Bud Baxter's Upper West Side apartment to carry out their extramarital affairs with multiple different women. But in particular the personnel director J.D. Sheldrake stands out. A sleazy serial philander, Sheldrake has cheated on his wife with literally dozens of women, many of whom were his own employees (including his long-suffering secretary Miss Olsen), stringing them along by pretending to be planning to leave his wife for them. He spends the film constantly pursuing his latest victim Fran Kubelik.

* ExecutiveExcess: All the company managers receive this treatment, with them all happily exploiting the opportunity to use Bud Baxter's Upper West Side apartment to carry out their extramarital affairs with multiple different women. But in particular the personel director Jeff D. Sheldrake stands out. A sleazy serial philander Sheldrake has cheated on his wife with literally dozens of women, many of whom were his own employees (including his long-suffering secretary Miss Olsen), stringing them along by pretending to be planning to leave his wife for them. He spends the film constantly pursuing his latest victim Fran Kubelik.

''The Apartment'' is a 1960 {{dramedy}} film. It was directed, produced, and co-written by Creator/BillyWilder and stars Creator/JackLemmon and Creator/ShirleyMacLaine.

The UsefulNotes/AcademyAward winner for Best Picture of 1960, ''The Apartment'' stars Creator/JackLemmon and Creator/ShirleyMacLaine, and was directed, produced, and co-written by Creator/BillyWilder.

C.C. "Buddy Boy" Baxter (Lemmon), a lowly office drone at a big [[BigApplesauce New York City]] insurance firm, has just found the solution for climbing up the corporate food chain: letting various company bigwigs use his apartment as a trysting place for their extramarital affairs. His boss, J.D. Sheldrake (Creator/FredMacMurray), discovers this, and promotes Baxter on the condition that he lets him use the apartment for his own affair. Naturally, Baxter accepts the condition, but things turn very complicated when he finds out that his crush, elevator operator Fran Kubelik ([=MacLaine=]), is Sheldrake's other woman.

Nominated for ten Oscars in all, it won five, including the aforementioned Best Picture, Director (Wilder), Original Screenplay (Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond), Art Direction, and Editing. The story was subsequently adapted into the 1968 stage musical ''Theatre/PromisesPromises''.

* ScreenToStageAdaptation: Adapted as the Broadway {{musical}} ''Theatre/PromisesPromises'', with a book by Creator/NeilSimon, music by Burt Bacharach and lyrics by Hal David.

** The shot where the camera swoops in to find Baxter at one in a sea of desks is a {{homage}} to King Vidor's 1928 silent classic, ''Film/TheCrowd''.

* SleepingWithTheBoss: Miss Kubelik. Who, as she learns from Miss Olsen, is only the latest in a long string of office conquests for Sheldrake.

* DiegeticSoundtrackUsage: The pianist at the bar where Fran meets Sheldrake plays the title theme for her when she enters.

Nominated for ten Oscars in all, it won five, including the aforementioned Best Picture, Director (Wilder), Original Screenplay (Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond), Art Direction, and Editing. The story would later be adapted into the 1968 stage musical ''Theatre/PromisesPromises''.

C.C. "Buddy Boy" Baxter (Lemmon), a lowly office drone at a big New York City insurance firm, has just found the solution for climbing up the corporate food chain: letting various company bigwigs use his apartment as a trysting place for their extramarital affairs. His boss, J.D. Sheldrake (Creator/FredMacMurray), discovers this, and promotes Baxter on the condition that he lets him use the apartment for his own affair. Naturally, Baxter accepts the condition, but things turn very complicated when he finds out that his crush, elevator operator Fran Kubelik ([=MacLaine=]), is Sheldrake's other woman.

C.C. "Buddy Boy" Baxter (Lemmon), a lowly office drone at a big New York City insurance firm, has just found the solution for climbing up the corporate food chain: let the company bigwigs use his apartment as a trysting place for their extramarital affairs. His boss, J.D. Sheldrake (Creator/FredMacMurray), discovers this, and promotes Baxter on the condition that he lets him use the apartment for his own affair. Naturally, Baxter accepts the condition, but things turn very complicated when he finds out that his crush, elevator operator Fran Kubelik ([=MacLaine=]), is Sheldrake's other woman.

The film would later be adapted into the 1968 musical ''Theatre/PromisesPromises''.

* HeadInOven: Bud fears Fran has made another attempt on her life while he was out when a neighbor informs him she smells gas from his apartment. Subverted in that Fran has only turned the stove on to boil some water; she didn't know it was a gas stove.

* RaceForYourLove: [[ZigzaggedTrope Zigzagged]]. In the film's last scenes, Miss Kubelik leaves Sheldrake on New Year's Eve and runs to Baxter's apartment... but she's just hurrying to him, rather than running against any particular thing. Then, as Kubelik's almost there, she hears a noise suspiciously similar to a gunshot - and runs faster... only to see Baxter with an opened bottle of champagne. In the end it turns out he ''was'' going to leave the titular apartment for good.

* RaceForYourLove: [[ZigzaggedTrope Zigzagged]]. In the film's last scenes, Miss Kubelik leaves Sheldrake on New Year's Eve and runs to Baxter's apartment - but she's just hurrying to him, rather than running against any particular thing. Then, as Kubelik's almost there, she hears a noise suspiciously similar to a gunshot - and runs faster... only to see Baxter with an opened bottle of champagne. In the end it turns out he ''was'' going to leave the titular apartment for good.

** Trying to schedule a tryst with one of the company switchboard operators, one of the bosses suggests they meet at the apartment on Thursday night. "Thursday?" she replies. "But that's ''Series/TheUntouchables'' with Bob Stack!"

* ExecutiveExcess: All the company managers receive this treatment, with them all happily exploiting the opportunity to use Bud Baxter's Upper West Side apartment to carry out their extramarital affairs with multiple different women. But in particular the personal director Jeff D. Sheldrake stands out. A sleazy serial philander Sheldrake has cheated on his wife with literally dozens of women, many of whom were his own employees (including his long-suffering secretary Miss Olsen), stringing them along by pretending to be planning to leave his wife for them. He spends the film constantly pursuing his latest victim Fran Kubelik.

* ThemeTuneCameo: The pianist at the bar where Fran meets Sheldrake plays the title theme for her when she enters.

* DeliberatelyMonochrome: The MGM logo is in color, but the film itself is in monochrome. Until ''Film/SchindlersList'', it was the last black and white film to win Best Picture.

** Baxter gets tickets to ''Theatre/TheMusicMan'' from Sheldrake and tries to take Miss Kubelik to the show, but she stands him up to meet with Sheldrake.

** Baxter gets tickets to ''Theatre/TheMusicMan'' from Sheldrake and tries to take Miss Kubelik to the show.

** Trying to schedule a tryst with one of the company switchboard operators, one of the bosses suggests they meet at the apartment on Thursday night. "Thursday? But that's ''Series/TheUntouchables'' with Bob Stack!"

** SantaClaus calls in at the bar where Baxter is drowning his sorrows, but his cheerful wisecracking is no match for the glum stare that Baxter gives him. At the end of the night, we see Santa himself sitting morosely at the bar, all alone.

[[quoteright:330:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/shirley_maclaine_jack_lemmon_the_apartment_1960.jpeg]]