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Theater of war, "survival of the loudest." Blake Edwards begins dryly as can be, the encounter with the general (Carroll O'Connor) registers The Naked and the Dead and the storming of the Sicilian town ca. 1943 evokes Huston's San Pietro. Then the bayonet meets the soccer ball and the widescreen suddenly erupts farcically with confused soldiers and gesticulating villagers. Uptight captain (Dick Shawn) and loose-limbed lieutenant (James Coburn) give the two sides of the G.I. Joe coin, the Italian commander (Sergio Fantoni) is happy to surrender but only after the annual festival. Confetti-speckled helmets and streamer-tangled jeeps, a morning hangover interrupted by the inspecting major (Harry Morgan). "What's the situation?" "Uh, fluid." Military rigidity versus earthy abandon, improvisation is the strategy in both combat and comedy in a rowdier, less whimsical counterpart to de Broca's King of Hearts. The by-the-book officer is unchained by flowing vino and the cleavage of the mayor's daughter (Giovanna Ralli), he poses for an upside-down snapshot and is soon under the sheets impersonating a choo-choo train. Elsewhere, the barracks hepcat is busy playing Edwards' stand-in, "directing" a phony battle with melodramatic deaths, cheering audiences, and coffee breaks. "Cannon to the right of them! Cannon to the left of them! Volley'd and thunder'd and Donder and Blitzen!" The sleeping grunt in the piazza fountain and the cracked chief in the catacombs, hapless robbers and glory-seeking Commies on the sidelines. Nazi spoilsports drop by to blur the line separating satire and suspense, switched uniforms point the way to victory. A dandy dash of controlled chaos, just the sweet spot between the classicism of Mister Roberts and the modernism of How I Won the War. With Aldo Ray, Leon Askin, Rico Cattani, Jay Novello, Vito Scotti, Johnny Seven, and Kurt Kreuger.
--- Fernando F. Croce |