The ending of “Let’s Make Love” (1960) resolves the central romantic conflict through a dramatic revelation and a decisive elevator moment. Throughout the film, billionaire Jean-Marc Clément has been masquerading as a struggling actor named Alexander Dumas to win the heart of performer Amanda Dell. At the climax, Clément orchestrates a scene in his office building where he sits behind his desk and has staff take dictation, definitively proving his true wealth and identity to Amanda and the theater director. This stark demonstration forces Amanda to confront the deception she’s been living with, setting the stage for the film’s romantic resolution.
The ending is notable for how it uses physical space—specifically a corporate office—to symbolize the truth that Clément has been hiding. Rather than a spontaneous confession or a slow reveal, he stages an elaborate proof of concept, making it impossible for Amanda to deny what she’s seeing. The billionaire doesn’t just tell her he’s rich; he shows her by performing wealth itself, summoning employees and conducting business in front of her. This method of revelation is distinctly tied to 1960s cinema conventions, where wealth and authenticity were often proven through visible markers of status rather than emotional vulnerability.
Table of Contents
- How Does the Deception Come to Light in the Ending?
- Amanda’s Reaction to the Truth
- The Elevator Reconciliation and Romantic Resolution
- Why the Ending Works Within the Film’s Romantic Framework
- The Deception as a Persistent Issue in 1960s Cinema
- The Office Building as a Character in the Ending
- The Film’s Release and Its Place in Monroe’s Career
How Does the Deception Come to Light in the Ending?
The unraveling of Clément’s false identity doesn’t happen by accident or through investigation. Instead, he deliberately chooses the moment and method of revelation, taking control of the narrative by inviting Amanda and the theater director to his office building. This calculated approach differs from what audiences might expect—rather than being caught in a lie, Clément stages the truth, turning the confession into a performance in itself. He demonstrates his actual power and resources by sitting at an executive desk and conducting real business, making the performance of wealth identical to wealth itself.
The mechanism of proof is specifically corporate and hierarchical. Clément doesn’t show Amanda a bank statement or a deed to property; he demonstrates his authority over employees and business operations. The staff taking dictation at his command provides tangible evidence of his position. For a 1960 audience, this was a particularly resonant image of power and authenticity—the ability to command others’ labor and attention was understood as the ultimate proof of wealth. This scene recalls earlier sequences in the film where Clément’s wealth was hinted at but obscured, making this revelation the narrative payoff to those earlier mysteries.
Amanda’s Reaction to the Truth
Upon realizing that Alexander Dumas is actually Jean-Marc Clément, the wealthy billionaire who has been deceiving her, Amanda becomes angry and immediately moves to leave. She rushes to the elevator and presses the down button, her departure marking a rejection not just of the lie but of Clément himself. This reaction grounds the film in genuine emotion—Amanda is not immediately forgiving or charmed by Clément’s wealth. Her anger is earned; she’s been pursuing what she believed was a genuine connection with an actor, only to discover she’s been manipulated by a billionaire playing a role.
The elevator becomes the crucial staging ground for the film’s emotional climax, and this detail reveals something important about how the film understands reconciliation. Amanda’s decision to leave isn’t passive; she actively seeks the exit, and Clément must make a choice in response. The elevator, as both a literal and symbolic descent from his office of power, represents Amanda’s rejection not just of him but of the entire world of wealth and corporate power he inhabits. Her willingness to walk away suggests that Clément’s money, impressive as it is, cannot automatically repair the breach of trust he’s created. This is a limitation of wealth as a solution to emotional problems—no amount of corporate demonstration can undo the deception itself.
The Elevator Reconciliation and Romantic Resolution
After Amanda presses the elevator button to leave, Clément makes a decisive move: he recalls the elevator back to the top floor, preventing her departure. This moment is the film’s central romantic gesture, but it functions differently than a traditional grand gesture might. Clément doesn’t pursue Amanda with words or grand promises; he literally controls the physical space to keep her present. When he joins her in the elevator, they embrace, marking the shift from conflict to resolution. This embrace in the enclosed space of the elevator is the film’s answer to Amanda’s anger—not an apology delivered on his terms, but a moment of genuine connection that transcends the corporate world he’s been demonstrating.
The elevator recall is significant because it removes Clément’s power to control the outcome. By joining Amanda in the elevator—descending with her rather than remaining in his office of power—Clément symbolically leaves behind his role as the all-powerful billionaire. The elevator becomes neutral ground, a space neither controlled by his wealth nor by her desire for the truth. In this confined space, both characters are equal, and the embrace that follows represents an acceptance of each other despite the deception and the disparity in wealth. The romantic resolution hinges on Clément’s willingness to step down from his position of power and meet Amanda at her level, literally descending with her rather than commanding her to ascend.
Why the Ending Works Within the Film’s Romantic Framework
The film’s ending is structured as a fairy-tale reversal with a modern twist. Typically, a woman discovers a man is wealthier than he appeared, leading to a happy ending based on financial security. But “Let’s Make Love” complicates this formula by making the deception the central source of conflict. The ending doesn’t simply reward Amanda for accepting a billionaire; it requires Clément to prove that he values her presence more than his position. The comparison between this ending and standard romantic comedies of the era reveals a film more psychologically interested in trust and equality than in the simple fantasy of marrying wealthy.
Directed by George Cukor and starring Marilyn Monroe as Amanda and Yves Montand as Clément, the film benefits from its two leads’ star power and screen chemistry. Monroe’s performance makes Amanda’s anger at the ending credible—she’s not portrayed as a gold-digger who should be thrilled to discover Clément’s wealth. Instead, her character has genuine feelings for the man she believed she knew, and the revelation that he’s been lying creates real emotional stakes. The tradeoff in the film’s ending is that it privileges emotional reconciliation over material fantasy. A lesser version of this film might end with Amanda simply delighted to be marrying a billionaire, but this version insists that the embrace in the elevator is contingent on Clément’s willingness to abandon his manipulative charade and meet Amanda as an equal.
The Deception as a Persistent Issue in 1960s Cinema
The theme of romantic deception was common in 1960s Hollywood, but “Let’s Make Love” treats it with unusual seriousness. Many films of the era would paint a wealthy man’s pursuit of a woman through false identity as charming or even necessary—a way of testing whether she loved him for his money or for himself. But the film doesn’t ultimately celebrate Clément’s deception; it forces him to confront it as a genuine betrayal. The warning implicit in the film’s ending is that deception, no matter how well-intentioned, damages trust in ways that wealth cannot repair. Amanda’s initial rage at the elevator is the film’s acknowledgment that manipulation has consequences, even when the manipulator is powerful and wealthy.
A limitation of the film’s ending is that it doesn’t fully explore what comes after the embrace. The viewer is left to assume that Amanda forgives Clément and they proceed toward a romantic future, but the film doesn’t show the difficult conversations that such reconciliation would require. Real trust would need to be rebuilt through actions over time, not through a single moment of physical closeness. The ending is satisfying as cinema but potentially unsatisfying as a realistic portrait of how betrayal is actually resolved in relationships. The film’s optimism about the power of that elevator moment to restore trust is characteristic of 1960s romantic cinema, where emotional climaxes were often treated as sufficient resolution for complex relational problems.
The Office Building as a Character in the Ending
The specific choice to reveal Clément’s identity in his office building is not incidental to the film’s meaning. The office represents the world of power, corporate control, and masculine authority that Clément has inhabited. By staging the revelation there, with employees taking dictation and the machinery of business operating around them, the film makes Clément’s wealth visible and undeniable. But the ending also shows that this world—impressive as it is—is not where the emotional truth of the film resides.
The actual resolution comes in the elevator, a space of transition that belongs to neither Clément’s world nor Amanda’s, suggesting that genuine connection requires both parties to leave behind their normal territories and meet in a liminal space. The architectural choice also reflects the visual grammar of 1960s cinema, where offices and boardrooms were increasingly used as settings for exploring questions of power and authenticity. Cukor’s direction uses the office building to establish the scale of Clément’s deception—the more impressive the office, the more egregious the lie. Amanda’s movement from office to elevator thus becomes a physical journey away from spectacle and toward something more genuine, even if that journey is ultimately halted and reversed by Clément’s control of the machinery.
The Film’s Release and Its Place in Monroe’s Career
“Let’s Make Love” premiered in 1960, a significant year for Monroe, who was navigating the transition from sex symbol to dramatic actress. The film’s ending, which gives Amanda agency in her own story—she becomes angry, she leaves, she forces Clément to follow—was part of a broader shift in how Monroe’s characters were being written. Rather than a passive romantic prize, Amanda is a performer with her own career and her own emotional autonomy.
The ending respects this characterization by showing that Amanda will not simply accept Clément’s wealth and status as sufficient recompense for his deception. The film was directed by George Cukor, a director known for his sophisticated handling of romantic comedy and his ability to draw complex performances from his actors. The ending reflects Cukor’s sensibility—it’s emotionally resonant without being saccharine, and it suggests psychological complexity underneath the fairy-tale structure. The embrace in the elevator is not presented as the end of the story but as a tentative beginning, a moment where two people who have been at odds choose connection over continued conflict.
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