Deux nigauds démobilisés

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.

Not sure why others who have commented on this film seem so lukewarm about it. I think this is a really underrated Abbott and Costello comedy and the script (contrary to what others have said) is actually quite good. It is more subtle than some of their earlier films and actually has a lot of pathos in addition to the comedy. It also has an amazing chase sequence for a finale.

Also-- this film does not contain the Susquehanna Hat sequence or the chase footage from "Never Give A Sucker An Even Break" (as is stated in two previous comments). The film they are confusing this with is another Abbott and Costello movie, "In Society."

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

We managed to win World War II in the European theater even with the presence of Bud and Lou in the American Army. The boys who enlisted in the army to get away from the cops in Buck Privates and found their nemesis patrolman, Nat Pendleton, as their sergeant are now returning veterans. Only Costello managed to smuggle in little Beverly Simmons, a French war orphan, in his duffel bag. Imagine going across the Atlantic without a change of clothes.

Beverly's the company mascot and she's adopted Costello so Bud and Lou are going to adopt her. Of course they run into all kinds of problems with the army, with the police and with immigration. Then again their situations make for the plot of Buck Privates Come Hone.

The original Buck Privates was as much musical as it was burlesque comedy. With the Andrews Sisters, Jane Frazee, there was not one dull moment in this film. For some reason the writers here did not include much of the classic comedy routines. There's only one here, the famous Left/Right routine with Costello getting all balled up with the word "right." No musical numbers except the men singing about how they're going home.

Lots of physical comedy though, depending as much on Nat Pendleton's reactions as well as Costello's knack for getting into situations that no one else could possibly. And we can't forget Donald MacBride who has the best slow burn in films save for Edgar Kennedy.

The climax is Costello's wild ride in a midget racing car which is well staged. Buck Privates Come Home isn't quite up to the standard they set in their wartime films, but it's still pretty funny and should appeal to more than just A&C fans.

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.