Let's Go Navy!

In their later films, I always marveled that the boys in The Bowery Boys were in their 30s. By the time the series ended, they were nearly 40! And, since the gang join the navy, you have to wonder if maybe they were too old to enlist back in 1951!

When the story begins, the Boys have been collecting for charity. However, two crooks dressed as sailors jump Slip and Sach and steal the money. To make it worse, there's no sign of the crooks and folks in the neighborhood begin wondering whether Sach and Slip stole the money and just blamed it on 'some sailors'. Given that the police seem to have no leads, the gang decides to join the navy and look for the crooks. After all, one has an unusual tattoo...and if they find the tattoed man, they'll solve the crime.

I always find it funny how easy it is to join and quit the service...as Abbott & Costello, Laurel & Hardy, The Three Stooges, Martin & Lewis, and the Bowery Boys join up only to civilians by their next movie! I also find it funny that the Boys want to find two specific sailors...at a time when there were probably a couple hundred thousand sailors (give or take)!

So is this any good? Well, like all the Bowery Boys films, it's NOT a film the average peson will enjoy. However, fans of the series should enjoy it well enough. While I am a bit of a fan, I must admit that the story makes less sense than usual, Sach might even be stupider than usual AND the inclusion of a 'funny' talking parrot is a mistake.

Slip and Sach lose over $1600 in charity money when they get robbed at gunpoint by two men dressed as Navy sailors. The guys are either looked upon with suspicion or dismissed by the likes of the police. Slip comes up with the idea to join the Navy to find the two crooked sailors.

This is a Bowery Boys film. It's a good setup but the guys don't actually solve the case. I would have prefer them bumbling through an investigation that actually had a chance. It would have been interesting if they ended up on the same ship as the two criminals. There would be more opportunities for comedy and drama. Otherwise, this is a perfectly fine Bowery Boys film.

Twenty-third entry in the Bowery Boys series from Monogram has Slip & Sach being robbed by a couple of crooks posing as sailors. The police are no help so the boys, along with the rest of their gang, join the Navy to try and find the crooks. That turns out to be as good an idea as you might expect. The cast of regulars are all enjoyable, with the focus as usual being on Slip (Leo Gorcey) and Sach (Huntz Hall). Hall seems to be trying extra hard in this one but getting little juice for his squeeze. The problem is the script isn't the best and if the boys are doing any of their notorious ad-libbing here, they weren't coming up with anything particularly funny. Very few malapropisms from Leo Gorcey, which is one of the series' funniest elements. William Benedict and David Gorcey are both fine although I think they only had a dozen lines between them the whole film. This is not only the last film in the series to feature Buddy Gorman, it's also Gorman's last film altogether. I think he speaks once or twice in this so no great loss. Bernard Gorcey is a highlight in his scenes as Louie the Sweet Shop owner. The rest of the cast includes Allen Jenkins, Paul Harvey, Jonathan Hale, and future murderer Tom Neal. Not one of the Boys' best, in my opinion, but entertaining enough. More amusing bits than anything laugh out loud funny.

Let's Go Navy finds Leo Gorcey getting another grand idea and getting his sidekicks to join in. When the Boys are robbed outside Louis's Sweet Shop by two men posing as sailors, he gets the brilliant idea to have them all join the Navy to find the crooks. They don't even really join as they find the enlistment papers of five guys who had some second thoughts. They all should have had second thoughts especially Huntz Hall.

Which is really just a convenient plot to hang a series of funny gags where the Boys become the shipboard nemesis of the captain Paul Harvey and CPO Allen Jenkins. Making a sailor out of Huntz Hall is as funny as making one out of Lou Costello.

The sad part was the trip wasn't necessary. You'll have to watch Let's Go Navy to see what I mean.

Let's Go Navy (1951)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Silly but charming entry has Slip (Leo Gorcey) and Sach (Huntz Hall) getting held up by a couple sailors who take off with nearly two grand. The boys decide to join the Navy to track down the thieves not knowing that the men were just in costume. It goes without saying but once on board the boys do non-stop damage. The 23rd entry is a pretty good one even though we're certainly not going to bear witness to any ground breaking comedy or Oscar-winning performances. I think the film does benefit from a better than normal screenplay that features a lot of longer takes that let the jokes come at a smaller but better pace than many of the previous entries. One of the best examples of this is a rather long sequence where the boys try to swab the decks but Sach keeps doing on dumb thing after another, which eventually gets under the skin of the CPO (Allen Jenkins). The scene goes on a good five minutes and instead of just one or two quick jokes the screenplay allows the scene to play out by letting the actors get into a rather good grove and actually perform. This sequence is followed with an even better one where Slip is feeding the Captain but doesn't realize the cheese on the plate is actually soap. Once again we could have had a couple simple jokes but instead the screenplay allows the scene to expand and really deliver something more than the obvious joke. It goes without saying but there are quite a few jokes that don't work and this includes a rather annoying talking bird that Sach becomes friends with. The actual robbery subplot doesn't have much going for it but I guess they were just looking for any cheap way to get the boys on the boat. Both Gorcey and Hall are up to their usual standards, although it seems like poor Sach is getting dumber with each new film. Charlita doesn't earn an Oscar but she's certainly worth looking at. Warner character actor Jenkins is in good form here and takes quite a beating but it was fun seeing him here. LET'S GO NAVY would appear to be a lazy entry just because the plot of a group of dummies going into the navy isn't original but the familiar set up actually leads to quite a few good jokes so fans of the series should find themselves entertained.