2003 saw the release of Down with Love, a quirky romantic comedy starring Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor that parodied 1959’s Pillow Talk. Featuring Rock Hudson and Doris Day in an enemies-to-lovers arc, Pillow Talk follows an interior decorator, and a playboy-musician develop a tumultuous relationship via their shared phone line. Down with Love does not share the characters and plot exactly, but rather it uses the stylistic qualities, memorable editing style and shenanigan-filled narrative of Pillow Talk to show affection for the film’s campiness.
One thing that Sontag makes clear in ‘Notes on “Camp”’ is that much of what we see as “Camp” was not initially created with camp in mind. She explains first and foremost that “[Camp] is one way of seeing the world as an aesthetic phenomenon. That way, the way of Camp, is not in terms of beauty, but in terms of the degree of artifice, of stylization.” (277). Immediately when comparing Pillow Talk and Down with Love, one can see how the latter has taken the (probably inadvertently) camp style of editing, costume and performance and exaggerated it to an artificial and purposefully stylised place.
Much of this is inherent of the era each film was made, Pillow Talk was set in the present, while Down with Love is (by loosely defined terms) a period piece. Sontag explains that through nostalgia, Camp emerges through historical distance; “the relation of Camp taste to the past is extremely sentimental”. Camp develops through “the love of the exaggerated”; the late fifties are often looked back on with nostalgia, and with fashion trends that are easily exaggerated (bright colours, wacky patterns and poufy skirts), Down with Love becomes a love letter to these Camp qualities of Pillow Talk (279). With mimicry, there is a fine line between mocking and admiration, but Down with Love manages to convey both. The film says the fifties were ridiculous, and we love it. It allows audiences to look back and laugh at trends that now appear outrageous but still appreciate it for what it was. Pillow Talk exists outside of camp, in its own right it is nothing more than classic fifties rom-com. But when a film like Down with Love takes its most camp features (costume, editing and music in this case) and exaggerate them to demonstrate the potential of these sensibilities, we can see the original film in a whole new camp light.
A specific example here is the editing of the telephone scenes. In Pillow Talk, there are fairly simple (but no less iconic) split screen edits of Doris Day and Rock Hudson on the phone. Down with Love mimics this to show a nostalgic affection for this but takes it further and uses this editing to create a euphemistic visual gag.
(excuse the poor quality)
(jump to 00:15, 07:24, & 08:30)
Sontag also suggests that “Camp which knows itself to be Camp (“camping”) is usually less satisfying” (282). While Down with Love is clearly intentionally camp, it remains the exception to this rule because we get satisfaction from this revelatory perspective on Pillow Talk. Down with Love does not propose itself seriously, but rather it exaggerates and reimagines a film that does. In this way, both films achieve the label ‘Camp’, while demonstrating different avenues by which it can be achieved.