It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

"BUtterfield 8" has to be one of the most undeserving movies to win an Academy Award (alongside the glorification of rich English people that was "Chariots of Fire"). I suppose that it's trying to make a point about child abuse, but it comes out as two hours of blandness. It truly goes overboard on trying to be a soap opera. It's well known that Elizabeth Taylor didn't like it; she and co-star Eddie Fisher (her then-husband) apparently called it "Butterball 4". The Best Actress Oscar should've gone to Shirley MacLaine for "The Apartment" (the story goes that they gave it to Liz basically as a get well present after her tracheotomy).The car chase and its shocking result turn out to be the only interesting part of the movie. If you're looking for a poodle skirt-era soaper that's at least memorable, I recommend "A Summer Place": it shows how the parents are (meanwhile, the Troy Donahue and Sandra Dee characters actually have a healthy, loving relationship but their parents insist on keeping them apart because they're "not right" for each other). As for John O'Hara, I haven't read any of his works, but a good adaptation of one of his works is the Paul Newman-Joanne Woodward movie "From the Terrace". Daniel Mann's good movies - that I've seen at least - are "Come Back, Little Sheba", "Teahouse of the August Moon" and "Willard".

The reason BUtterfield 8 is so famous is two-fold: Elizabeth Taylor and the Hays Code. Before the fall of the Hays Code, a movie like this could never be made, so in 1960, Hollywood was thrilled to make a film about a call-girl. Since the call-girl was played by someone so beautiful and scantily clad, audiences were thrilled to see it. When they flocked to the theaters upon its release, they were greeted by life size cardboard cutouts of Elizabeth Taylor (I know movie theaters today are always decorated like that, but in 1960 it was new) and phone booths in which you could dial the phone number BUtterfield 8 and listen to a prerecorded message from the star. What a publicity campaign! Elizabeth Taylor won an Oscar during the 1961 ceremony, but it was clear even at the time that she didn't really win for her performance. She'd recovered from a nearly fatal bout of pneumonia near the voting period, and since she'd recently made her way back into America's good graces after being branded as a homewrecker, the Academy rewarded her.Liz herself notoriously dissed the film, and I can't say I blame her. The film isn't that great, and it's also pretty dated, since countless movies about prostitutes have been made since. The shock value isn't there anymore. If you want to see Elizabeth Taylor in a negligee and you can't find Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, I guess you can sit through this one. But try and find something else; there are so many other movies that show off her beauty.

This is a fascinating flick, although probably not for the reasons MGM intended. The story goes that Elizabeth Taylor was forced into it to fulfill her contract and she fought tooth and nail to get out of it and that she hated it to her dying day. If true, then La Liz must've been the consummate professional from top to bottom because she gives a riveting performance and she must've gotten a laugh at the irony of her Oscar for it. Another part of the intrigue is the sheer strangeness of the flick itself. All the characters are weird and detestable or just annoying. Liz's Gloria is supposed to be a prostitute but due to the Hollywood censorship of the time, the script dances all around that fact while admitting it one minute and denying it in the next. It's all pretty bizarre, but Liz's performance is unfailingly superb all the way through. Her husband at the time, Eddie Fisher, plays Gloria's best friend, a guy who acts thoroughly gay but who actually has a girlfriend made to look exactly like his ex, Debbie Reynolds. Laurence Harvey's Wes is a repellent and slimy alcoholic and his wife (Dina Merrill) is a world-class WASP martyr that has to be seen to be believed. There is some great catty dialogue between Gloria and the girlfriend and Gloria and the best friend of Gloria's oblivious mother. Gloria never gives any ground in any catfight and it's fantastic to watch. Anyway, this movie is interesting for a lot of odd reasons, but Liz elevates the whole mess to a very watchable and amusing flick.

I think the best way to write about Butterfield 8 is to keep it simple and honest. And the truth is this is like a television soap drawn out to 109 minutes. The fact is, this is very dated with melodramatic acting and dialog. The story itself is tragic with a woman who has passed her time as a call girl who desperately wants to have respectability. But the acting has a fake staged feel to it. Probably better suited for a play. The most likable character, played by Eddie Fisher, has very dull dialog. There are a few scenes that have impact but the rest are marred by tired, trite, dull dialog. It's almost as if the actors deliver performances that are exactly what we would expect. Nothing new and it all has a grim feel to it.At least in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" there is a glimmer of hope that our call girl will leave her profession and marry the struggling, handsome writer who, in his own way, was offering a service to people for money also. But this story never offers even a glimmer of hope for anyone. Heavy and soapy.