Buck Privates Come Home

This movie just seems to cash in on the original film which was a big hit back in 1941 but the past couple of movies from Abbott and Costello were flops and this movie does seem to be just thrown together. I don't know if this movie was a hit or not but their careers didn't do that well until they started making their monster movies like Frankenstein and The Mummy. I can't believe Leonard Maltin actually gave this three stars and said it was better then the original. This movie stars right after the war in which they are going home but it turns out Costello brought a kid back on the boat and the kid is a foreign citizen and Costello tries to hide the kid, so she can't be deported. She is found out but escapes and winds up hiding out with Abbott and Costello and Nat Pendleton who was their captain in the army and now a cop is looking for the kid. The movie just doesn't work and does seem thrown together.

After two box office disappointments in a row ("Little Giant" and "The Time of Their Lives"), Universal put Abbott and Costello back into familiar territory with a sequel to "Buck Privates." Here, the boys return from France to find familiarity in civilian life by selling ties on a street corner again. Costello has stowed away Evie, the French girl who was the camp mascot, aboard ship, and now must find a way for her to stay in the US.

Through a series of situations and some funny material, A&C make the best of a sometimes weak script. The film has little continuity from the original "Buck Privates", which explains the excerpt from the original film during the first ten minutes. For continuity's sake, the movie does get a big boost by the return of Nat Pendleton as the sergeant. It also helps matters much when we get to see Costello get a couple of shots into Pendleton -- especially after the abuse he receives from him in the two films! Passable entertainment, and A&C fit back into their old characters well. 6 out of 10.

Abbott and Costello return from the war as buck privates. Although the credits list Abbott as Corporal Slicker Smith, he doesn't have corporal stripes on his shirts. The reference intended probably was that these are the buck privates who went in (form the first film) and now they're coming home. It's a comedy and family film that mixes in America's participation in the war. This is done with newsreel footage from before the start to the victory marches in Europe and the return home parades. With those are insets of Abbot and Costello joining and returning home, before the meat of the story takes place.

The fact that these guys would be coming back - it looks like at whole platoon or more, as buck privates is somewhat curious, and one wonders how funny that may have been to veterans at the time. They all would have had to goof up in some way or have been busted. Costello's dress uniform has six hash marks on the sleeve - indicating three years (six months per hash) of combat duty. But they went into the Army In 1940 and Sgt. Collins comments that they had been together six years.

Although the draft didn't start until Sept. 16, 1940, the Army and Navy had beefed up recruiting early in the year in anticipation of entering the WW II which had officially begun in Oct. 1939. And, with three million Americans in Europe at the end of the war (VE Day was May 8, 1945), home rotations would continue through 1946.

Now that that's settled, on to this fairly funny story of Costello's Herbie Brown smuggling an orphaned French girl aboard ship to get her into the U.S. This becomes a constant chase with their former First Sergeant Collins, trying to apprehend the threesome. He is played by Nat Pendleton who is back on his New York police beat. How Evie, played by Beverly Simmons, gets into the U.S. and escapes being deported is part of the funny early stuff. But when Herbie and Bud Abott's Slicker Smith meet up with Evie's friend and former WAC Sylvia Hunter (played by Joan Shawlee) , they soon find themselves in the midget car racing arena.

This all serves for some wacky car driving and chase scenes - with Herbie behind the wheel, naturally. It's a fun film that the whole family should enjoy.

Buck Privates Come Home is directed by Charles Barton and written by John Grant, Frederic I. Rinaldo and Robert Lees. It stars Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Tom Brown, Nat Pendleton, Joan Fulton and Beverly Simmons. Cinematography is by Charles Van Enger and music by Walter Schuman.

Abbott and Costello star as two GI's returning from their service who get involved with much malarkey as they try to adopt a six year old orphan who Herbie (Costello) sneaked back in his duffel bag.

The 19th film in the Abbott and Costello series, Buck Privates Come Home is the sequel to Buck Privates from 1941 and evidently it was produced to return the boys to safe commercial ground. It worked and a year later they would pair up with Frankenstein for the first of their much loved films with the Universal Monsters.

Formula is obviously the same as the boys produce high energy slapstick wrapped around a thin plot line. Pace is never less than brisk and with the pair on fine form a number of scenarios score high on the laugh meter. Highlights include sequences involving a time bomb, a sawhorse (come see-saw) table involving food and the customary pie in face gag, Costello in high clothes line peril, some bang-bang at the bank commotion and the finale is a riot as Costello causes chaos behind the wheel of a midget motor car. Pendleton is excellent as the fall guy, first as the army sergeant and later as a New York cop, and Brown and Fulton provide the lovey dovey axis.

Fun and frothy, just how the best A & C films should be. 7.5/10

This happens extremely rarely but yes, this sequel to the original "Buck Privates" is better. Why? There's more of A&C in this one actually as opposed to the original which has more musical numbers in it and more of a romance subplot. In "Buck Privates Come Home" there's more typical A&C burlesque routines that made them famous in the first place. I'm speaking primarily of the 'ol "Floogle Street Sketch" and the story about Floogle Street and the Susquehannah Hat Company. Either the street name or the name of the hat company sets everyone off whenever Lou mentions them to passing pedestrians. It is pure classic comedy, of which apparently writers forgot how to do nowadays. I highly recommend this flick!