I ragazzi di Camp Siddons

I was very pleased to see that Disney finally released this movie on DVD. I have been wanting to see it for a long time, but not only because it was another Disney film with Fred MacMurray. Rather, I am a Scout Leader, and can relate to many of the things in the picture, and that made it a special delight for me.

This was Kurt Russell's first Disney picture. He is wonderful here as the reluctant boy with a drunken father. While he loves his dad, he is embarrassed when others see him. I have seen scouts in these positions.

With my two sons in Scouting, they enjoyed this movie very much. Even my daughter, who is a Girl Scout, liked it too. A measure of a great film is when it makes you want to see it again.

Out of my usual four-star rating system, I would give this: ***.5

Follow Me Boys is a wonderful film that deals with the life of Lem, played by Fred McMurray, and his tenureship as a scoutmaster in a small mid-western town. As a scout myself, I feel a sense of loss when I watch this film. It shows a community that supports the youth and wish to see them grow into mature people. Too bad it isn't that way any more.

The Walt Disney company serves up some memorable schmaltz with this adaptation of a book by MacKinlay Kantor. Fred MacMurray is inherently endearing as Lemuel Siddons, travelling with a jazz band in 1930 who decides to set down roots in a small town. Going to work as a store clerk, he has aspirations of being a lawyer, but he soon discovers what his true passion in life will be: leading a Boy Scout troop. And so he does, seeing them through the good and bad times for the next 20 years, and becoming a father figure to troubled Whitey (15 year old Kurt Russell, in his first Disney film), whose biological dad (Sean McClory) is a hopeless alcoholic.

Wonderful performances by all concerned - Lillian Gish plays a rich but generous local, Elliott Reid her cranky, greedy nephew, the radiant Vera Miles as Lem's sweetheart, Charlie Ruggles as kindly storekeeper John Everett Hughes, Parley Baer as the mayor - go a long way towards keeping this feature watchable for an admittedly overlong two hours and 12 minutes. The comedic sequence where Lem and his current troop get taken aback by soldiers playing war games doesn't really add anything to the story, though, and could have been taken out without detracting from it. Overall, the film IS very corny, but it's delivered with such square-jawed conviction that the viewer won't much mind being manipulated so frequently.

A nice depiction of small town America from the '30s to the '50s also helps, along with a welcome sense of humour at times. (Lem's troop in the '30s includes kids with such colourful nicknames as "Hoodoo" and "Beefy".) And it is refreshing to see a scrupulously wholesome family film inspire its viewers, young and old, with its portrayal of the Boy Scout tradition.

The excellent cast includes such other performers as Luana Patten, Ken Murray, Donald May (as the grown-up version of the Kurt Russell character), Steve Franken, William Reynolds, Richard Bakalyan, Willis Bouchey, and Adam Williams.

"Follow Me, Boys" will be too sentimental for some viewers to take, but others will find it utterly delightful.

Seven out of 10.

One of Walt Disney's best feature films from the Sixties, Follow Me Boys is a two hour tribute to the Boy Scouts and to one man's dedication to them. And the odd thing is that Fred MacMurray got into Scouting for the most basic of all human reasons.

Fred MacMurray arrives at this whistle stop of a Midwest town while with a traveling band in the Roaring Twenties. He's frustrated both trying to study law and play the saxophone for Ken Murray's band. On an impulse he's so taken with the town that he makes a decision right there to stay. He sees a help wanted sign in the window of Charlie Ruggles general store and Ruggles hires him right there. And of course there's the sight of Vera Miles working at the bank across the street that really makes him want to stay.

In fact at a town meeting MacMurray suggests that a Scout Troop be formed as an activity for the kids. When Elliott Reid who is Miles's boss at the bank and MacMurray's rival demurs saying he doesn't have the time to be a Scoutmaster, MacMurray moves right on in, mainly to make an impression with Miles.

After that the Scouts become his life and MacMurray like George Bailey in It's A Wonderful Life becomes the leading citizen of that town. He's the moulder of the youth and biggest influence on their character. And in one case he and Miles become foster parents to Kurt Russell and save him from what would have been a dissolute life.

There's a little bit of Boys Town in this film because there aren't any really bad boys here as Father Flanagan opined. But the main influence on this film adapted from a MacKinley Kantor story is Goodbye Mr. Chips. MacMurray does everything, but teach school for them.

Best scenes are when the kids are trapped in some army war games and through Boy Scout ingenuity come through it just fine.

Follow Me Boys gives Fred MacMurray one of his best roles in a Disney feature and it holds up well for today's audience.

I was six years old when I saw this movie in the theaters in 1966. Back then the screens were big and a little kid like me, seeing other kids on screen looking bigger-than-life, wanted to be just like them. I never joined the boy scouts, but the film's somewhat typical Disney values definitely had an influence on me. Now let's fast-forward almost 40 years later and look at the film from a grown-up perspective. The acting here is marvelous. Anyone over 40 knows all about Fred MacMurray and the great actor that he was, both on TV and in films. Throw in the pretty Vera Miles, the legendary Lillian Gish, and the I-know-his-voice-from-Saturday-morning-cartoons Charlie Ruggles, and it all comes together nicely. The best part of this film? Not the catchy Sherman Brothers theme song...but perhaps one of the best child-actor performances ever...Kurt Russel. Want a movie where you'll cry a bit but then feel real good at the end? Follow this one!