Operation Mad Ball

Were the Eisenhower years so super uptight that this passed for entertainment in 1957? The squareness of this service comedy is straight out of 1943. Maybe recruitment was down after Korea and Uncle Sam was having trouble fooling Iowa farmboys into signing up for the meat grinder. "Look boys, put on a uniform, have some laughs, meet some dames." In any event, there are a few recognizable male actors who do their best with fairly low-brow material. But the real appeal in 1957, I'm guessing, would have been the attractive women. That doesn't amount to much when you're watching in 2021. Structurally, OK, there's a passing resemblance to MASH. But come on now, MASH is an absurdist treasure crafted by one of film-making's all-time masters. Operation Mad Ball is a warmed-over stage play hauled out of the script pile 15 past its freshness date.

Reading these reviews were spot on while being simultaneously disconcerting. Other movies were mentioned that had influence on this one, but didn't Operation Mad Ball remind anybody besides me of Hogan's Heroes? And I'm not referencing the fact that Jack Lemmon's character was named Hogan, although this might have been the basis for the TV title. Although the circumstances aren't quite the same (albeit they are both set in WWII), some of the dialog is exactly as I remember from the TV show. Even the sight gags and the situations are similar. Only things lacking are the Germans and the teapot. It's a fun movie and well worth watching. I've never seen it before and just can't help comparing it to Hogan's Heroes. Mickey Rooney is a hoot!

Surprisingly flat comedy from a promising cast and writers. With a famous comedian, Ernie Kovacs, a future star Jack Lemmon and more than able support from the likes of Dick York, Arthur O'Connell and Kathryn Grant, as well as writers including Blake Edwards, we might have expected more. This pseudo-sex farce set on a US military base in France just after the end of WWII never picks up steam as a comedy. It does derive some energy at moments from Kovacs and Co. There's also Mickey Rooney, who has the liveliest scene in the picture as a goofball who memorizes the World Almanac. Rooney also livens up the "Mad Ball" at the end with his raring-to-go band. But none of that is enough. It was 1957 and the audience was supposed to enjoy the not very subtle winking dialog about what men and women want to "do" with each other. There's a song under the credits, nicely sung by uncredited Sammy Davis Jr. Others seem to find this film a laugh riot. Well, to each his/her own.

Remember MASH (1970)? Well. This movie predates it, and in this one the medical corps also throws plenty of spanners that inevitably gum up the way of the army. Of course, this earlier movie doesn't have the total irreverence of Mash, but there is the same abuse and misuse of army regulations, which inevitably leads to the double takes of the usual, flabbergasted and endlessly (and always uselessly) flabbergasted officers. Unfortunately, this movie does not come across with anything like the same success, thanks to surprisingly heavy-handed direction by Richard Quine (a genial man, noted for his friendly approach and light touch), plus the script's over-reliance on dialogue that is both over- repetitive and tiresomely prone to milk the very last grains of humor from situations that were not really all that funny to begin with.

Obviously made to capitalise on Jack Lemmon's Oscar-winning turn as Ensign Pulver in 'Mister Roberts' and the current popularity of mildly satirical service comedies like 'Teahouse of the August Moon' and 'Bilko'. With that title and that cast, I've been expecting something fast-paced and zany; but mounting a big party behind the backs of their superiors hardly seems to justify such a long (105 minutes) and elaborately produced movie, which never takes flight and feels like the filmed play it is. The music score is twee, the photography drab; and its terrific cast all talk too much. (I also think it should have been in colour, like most of its contemporaries were.) It's digs at military bureaucracy and (very) odd moments of black humour have led to comparisons with 'MASH', but a truer precursor to that is actually 'Captain Newman, M.D.' (1963), with Gregory Peck and Tony Curtis. See that instead.

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.