O Baile Maluco

First: The Sony movie channel has been periodically showing this, in a hilariously good, maybe even remastered transfer. Look for it.

Second, ignore the poster, the marketing of the time, even the title. It's not slapstick, no impossibly improbable stuff and really, it's more like a heist movie than a pure comedy. All machinations of some scheming lower ranks to get a party together, all within or by skirting regulations.

No physical impossibilities, no moustache twirling villains breaking the law themselves, no one runs around in a gorilla suit. It's even relatively realistic B&W.

Nothing like Bilko or so on, and all the better for it.

Jack Lemmon, two years after winning an Oscar for "Mister Roberts," stars in the tale of Army hijinks just after the end of WWII somewhere in France. It's amazing to watch just how much influence he has and he's not even a superior officer. He's trying to organize a ball for the men before they get back to the states. For many, it may seem like why should we care. But, for those who are patient, it does get better as it goes along. Mickey Rooney shows up in the second half, who always is a "ball" waiting to happen. It may not be Lemmon's best material, but costarring Ernie Kovacs, Dick York, and Arthur O'Connell, it deserves to be seen more often.

I loved this movie! A wonderful cast and very funny. Mickey Rooney was a riot, and Ernie Kovacs was a treasure, too bad there aren't more places to see him. The words 'comic genius' are tossed around excessively these days, but he was the genuine article. Jack Lemmon, as the young and proper private, was funny in the Lemmonish way we've come to love, and several others, just beginning their careers in the movies, are interesting to watch. I've been trying to find this movie to rent, but apparently it's not been released. I wonder why not. It could be considered a classic comedy of the post-World-War-II era. If there is information about this issue, it could be posted on this board, so those seeking to view the film would know that it is unavailable at this time.

An easy-going bumbling Colonel commands a military hospital, the 1066th. A self-serving martinet second-in-command tries to use military regulations to tyrannize over the hospital staff. A fun-loving conniver wants to give the hospital staffers a chance to enjoy the company of the hospital's nurses while the second-in-command tries to thwart him. If Jack Lemmon and his friends had been doctors and officers, instead of enlisted personnel, the general resemblance to MASH would have been complete. When Richard Hooker's novel MASH was turned into a TV series (after passing through the movies), the writers must have been familiar with this movie. Curiouser and curiouser.

What breaks down military discipline faster than pull from the opposite sex. But that's what's happening to the enlisted men of a hospital detachment US Army with all those fetching nurse officers next to them. It's France right after the war and the boys are getting restless. The trouble is that Capt. Locke (Kovacs) is a pompous stickler for discipline, while mastermind Pvt. Hogan (Lemmon) schemes to let nature take its course. It's a hilarious battle between enlisted men and officers. Can fast-talking Hogan put on his mad-ball mixer before killjoy Locke foils his romantic plans. Both comedians are in fine form, making this a service comedy whose modest budget and b&w photography probably got lost in the mix of the time. Too bad, because the movie's fast paced, full of clever situations, with an attractive and lively cast.

Kovacs and Lemmon are a great pairing, showing again how much delicious humbug was lost in that tragic Kovacs auto accident. Support comes through, as well- a demure Kathryn Grant as the wide-eyed lieutenant, a cranky Dick York as the frustrated corporal, and a rhyming Mickey Rooney as the "twiddle-de-de, it must be me" logistics sergeant--- all orchestrated by up-and-coming director Richard Quine. Anyway, this is a good chance to catch up with the whole madcap bunch in a movie that remains a genuine sleeper. Now if I could just figure out what the heck an ocarina is.