Wo bitte gibt's Bier an der Front?

Bob Hope, Phyllis Diller, Gina Lollabrigida, and Jeffrey Hunter star in this very lightweight comedy about Army life. There's really not much to say, except it's not that great. It has a few laughs and may keep your mind off real-life problems, but the material is just embarrassing for the actors involved, especially Jeffrey Hunter who dreams! of Phyllis Diller. They really milk for every drop the ugliness of Phyllis Diller, but, if she cleaned herself up, she wouldn't look as bad as she's reputed to be. If you're looking for a Bob Hope movie, you couldn't do much worse than this film; but I haven't seen Cancel My Reservation. Don't say you haven't been warned. With them talking about beer all the time, this is one war with a head on it!

Most of Bob Hopes best films were made in the 1930s and 40s. Many of his later movies, to put it charitably, looked like he was just going through the motions...at best. Because of this, I had pretty low expectations of this film when I sat down to watch it...especially since he is 65 and is playing a sergeant! Were my instincts right? Read on...

Sgt. O'Farrell is stationed on a small, out of the way island in the Pacific during WWII. While they don't see any action, they don't see much of anything else, as their supplies have been cut off and they are desperate for some female companionship. Suddenly, a transport plane makes it through and their wish is granted...of sorts. The 'woman' is Nurse Krause...and she's played by Phyllis Diller! As for the rest of the nurses...they're all guys! Inexplicably, Gina Lollobrigida just happens to be there. And, soon beer cans from a sunken supply ship start washing ashore...and suddenly morale improves tremendously. But the Sergeant needs to keep a secret....his partner who is helping him retrieve all the beer is a Japanese soldier (Mako) who has little interest in the war.

So does all this sound very funny? No. And that's the problem. You would expect a Bob Hope film to be a comedy but barely anything even comes close to making you laugh and the biggest jokes(???) are about how ugly Diller is...and that really isn't particularly funny. As a comedy, it stinks...and as a war picture, it's not much either due to the strange plot, overuse of bad stock footage and an almost complete lack of anything exciting. A dud...but amazingly NOT among Hope's very worst films of the era, as he managed to be even more unfunny in films such as "How to Commit Marriage" (1969)....a film about as funny as Ebola.

I own this movie and I really did not think that it would be all that great. But I was pleasantly surprised. It's GREAT and Bob Hope and Phyllis Diller work great together. I highly recommend it. I love the two of them together. I have to say that I consider Bob Hope to be in the top 10 of funniest comedians.

I have never expected a great deal from Bob Hope's comedies and know perfectly well that his films were meant to amuse their audiences in a lighthearted, unpretentious way. Hope was always the same as an actor but even his sameness was somewhat brilliant and I tend to like him. I remember having had lots of fun seeing THE PALEFACE, Paris HOLIDAY, BACHELOR IN PARADISE and other of his films. THE PRIVATE NAVY OF SGT. O'FARRELL is just an average effort. Frank Tashlin was an excellent director but this is not one of his major comedies. The plot could have resulted in a more substantial screenplay, in better devised and more entertaining comic scenes. The film has an obvious 60's look and no effort was made to give it a more authentic 40's atmosphere. Hope and Diller are their usual selves, and occasionally make one laugh. Gina Lollobrigida is as beautiful as ever but has very little to do. As usual, she is merely seen as a decorative presence. She could be so much more, as we know from films such as COME September, HOTEL PARADISO and BUONA SERA, MRS. CAMPBELL. Mylène Demongeot does a sort of cameo. It would have been to the film's advantage to give her more screen time.

By the time Bob Hope got to making The Private Navy of Sgt O'Farrell the comedy well was running a bit dry. Thiw was material that he could have done 20 years before, during the post World War II period.

Somebody must have gotten an idea for this film noticing that in McHale's Navy, Ernest Borgnine, Tim Conway and the gang had their own personal Japanese prisoner. So a whole film was built around a leftover Japanese soldier on the backwater island that Hope is stationed on. Hope has his own Ensign Parker in Jeffrey Hunter and his own Captain Binghamton in John Myhers.

We've got both Army and Navy personnel here though the Navy seems to be in charge. John Myhers is no Joe Flynn with that officious monotone as Captain Binghamton. And no one would ever say that Jeffrey Hunter had Tim Conway's gift for comedy.

And Hope looks every bit of the 65 years he had under his belt when this film was made. He ought to have been stateside collecting those first Social Security checks issued.

Mako does well as Calvin Coolidge Ishimura an American Japanese who had the misfortune to be visiting relatives in the old country at the time of Pearl Harbor. And Phyllis Diller as the man starved nurse Krauss earns a few laughs.

The film is about Hope's pursuit of a sunken supply ship that was loaded with beer. From what I remember of the army it probably would have been near beer which was all an enlisted man could get on Fort Polk, so I didn't see what the fuss was about. Frank Tashlin the director clearly ripped this one off from the classic British comedy Whiskey Galore.

Joke kind of fell flat as the beer probably was.