1959 - OPERATION PETTICOAT, a World War II submarine comedy

Cary Grant's production company is behind this sort of kind of funny service comedy. Supposed comedy master Blake Edwards was hired to direct.   The then hot Tony Curtis was cast as one of Cary Grant's officers.  Operation Petticoat is set aboard a submarine called the Sea Tiger during World War II. 

After being damaged from a Japanese attack, Curtis plays that standard military character of the "scrounger" a guy who can lay his hands on parts legally or illegally that will get the Sea Tiger back into service.  After 30 minutes of this stealing the parts comedy stuff, the Sea Tiger finally goes to sea.  However on their first mission they end up rescuing a group of Navy nurses.  From this point on until the end of the film we get lots of mildly smutty sex jokes as the men of the Sea Tiger have to deal with buxom nurses squeezing their bosoms around the tight hallways of the submarine.  There are also lots of bra jokes as if sailors had never seen bras before.

Well the film was a big commercial hit when released but I would say it really hasn't stood the test of time. Blake Edwards has loaded the film up with his usual slapstick humor which doesn't really work all the well, most of the time it doesn't work at all.  The camera leering on the bottoms and chests of the nurses is kind of in poor taste. You just want to say I get it, breast jokes are sort of funny especially lots of them.

 

Cary Grant as usual brings his comedy timing and professionalism to the role of the captain.  Tony Curtis is the wheeler dealer lover boy and I guess he's alright.  Someone was smart enough to cast some decent character actors for the film.  Gene Evans, Arthur O'Connell, Virginia Gregg and Gavin McLeod are fun to watch.  The nurses are the usual bunch of Hollywood starlets as they like to say, Joan O'Brien, Madlyn Rhue, Dina Merrill and Marion Ross bring their shall we say "assets" to the film.

 

The film was written by a couple of comedy veterans, Stanley Shapiro  who specialized in early 60's sex comedies like Pillow Talk and Lover Come Back.  Shapiro shares a screen writing credit with Maurice Richlin who wrote silly sex comedies as well.  This film actually was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Screenplay.  However Shapiro and Richlin won that year for another inane comedy the Doris Day, Rock Hudson movie Pillow Talk.  Interestingly enough Cary Grant was in one of Alfred Hitchcock's best films the same year as this piece of junk,  North By Northwest which won no Academy Awards.  Well that's showbiz I guess.

The film runs a whooping 124 minutes for what is essentially a very light weight comedy.