All Ashore

All Ashore is this light musical from Columbia Pictures that I think was made to give Catalina Island tourism a big push. I wouldn't be surprised if Harry Cohn didn't have some business interests there.

The male leads were two guys on the downward slope of their careers, Dick Haymes and Ray McDonald, and Mickey Rooney who was trying to transition to adult star and shed his Andy Hardy image. The female leads are Barbara Bates, Jody Laurence, and in her final film Peggy Ryan.

The sailors on leave musical is something that has been done and redone into several incarnations. Off the top of my head I can think of such films as Follow the Fleet, Hit the Deck, Anchors Aweigh, and On the Town, all of which are better than All Ashore. Then again these musicals had scores written by such folks as Vincent Youmans, Irving Berlin, Jule Styne, Sammy Cahn, and Leonard Bernstein. The score here by Fred Karger and Robert Wells is singularly unmemorable.

The performers all have done better material themselves. Mickey Rooney had a role written for him that made him like Lou Costello constantly being taken advantage of by a pair of Abbotts in McDonald and Haymes. What was great for Costello doesn't quite work for the Mick.

All Ashore is all right, but hardly a nautical treasure.

This 50's musical is not on video and so is very hard to find. You'll have to search the schedules of AMC or TCM to try to locate it. Starring mellow, unassuming Dick Haymes, this film is surprisingly tuneful (original music by Morris Stoloff). Okay, the story is the hardly-original story of 3 gobs on leave, but you get the beautiful backdrop of Catalina, rather than over-used New York. Blake Edwards has a writing credit.

When I was a kid in bombed out London in the '50's I went to the local picture house to get away from the wreckage of not only the bomb-sites, but also my rowing drunken parents. This movie got me away - double. Loved the three guys, especially a scene in a bar where one of the sailors dances with a girl. It was magic. Also Micky Rooney sitting on a swing and singing a song. He was lonely and feeling a mug. That's just the way I felt at that time. Not a mug, I was 12 and no kid is a mug. You got to be 21 - at least. But I was loney and I associated with these 3 guys. Since, I have danced and known beautiful girls. I would like to find this film again. Yet it has never been played on TV. Perhaps it is lost, crumbled in some archive and never to be returned to our life again. Pity. Great little musical.

As someone else wrote, this film is surprisingly tuneful. LOTS of musical numbers, and almost every one is catchy and hummable. The only negative in the film is a tedious dream sequence of dueling knights. Fortunately, it only lasts five minutes. Interesting to see Barbara Bates, looking much more beautiful than in her famous appearance at the end of "All About Eve."

The Technicolor photography is gorgeous, and the Catalina locations are fun to see. All the people in the many crowd scenes, such as one at a big dance hall, are extremely good-looking and well-dressed. Dick Haymes had one of the all-time great voices, and there is a jazzy dance number by a surprisingly sexy Peggy Ryan (who doesn't play a sexy part in the rest of the picture), and her partner Ray McDonald, that is absolutely dynamite. Peggy was one hell of a dancer.

For those who appreciate lighthearted musicals of the early 50's, highly recommended.

This is the second Columbia service comedy produced by the combined efforts of Richard Quine, Blake Edwards and Mickey Rooney. In their first service comedy, "Sound Off", Rooney is his familiar cocky self, but is somewhat restrained. This time around, Rooney is made the patsy, having Dick Haymes and Ray McDonald as his con artist buddies. Sailor films featuring three sailors became the rage with the success on "On the Town", both on Broadway and on the screen. But there is no point in having three sailors here. The only difference between the Haymes and McDonald characters is that Haymes is a singer (his dancing is laughable) and McDonald is a dancer (who can carry a melody). Their characters have no depth or likability. Rooney's character is sympathetic and well written, but it's not for Rooney. He's out of his element. Usually, Rooney is the confident con man who has to defeat the obstacles. This would have been better played by Danny Kaye, Red Skelton, Donald O'Connor or even Arnold Stang. As always, Rooney handles the physical comedy beautifully, and he is permitted to overact. Quine's direction of Rooney is an improvement over "Sound Off". The writing by Qunie and Edwards is also an improvement, with broader situations. Fred Karger's songs are pleasant and an improvement over the songs in "Sound Off". However, the script and the direction kill off a great pay-off gag to end the film. I saw it coming, Quine hints at it, but then softens the finish. Had they continued to work together, the Quine-Edwards-Rooney team might have come up with some comic winners. They all have the skills and their two films have much potential. The first film misses the mark, but this one has much more going for it, with the exception of Rooney's characterization.