Well, I am a fan of the Marine Corps. True, I spent my four-year military career in the Coast Guard but it was just as rugged as the Marine Corps. It was very nice to be served breakfast in bed by the attractive, blond, seventeen-year-old Swedish maids but there must be no expression in Swedish for "medium rare" because they kept fouling up the steak and eggs. But I taught the Marines at Camp Lejeune for several years and they were among the best of students. When they're sharp, they're really sharp. It's also the only service in which the officers' dress uniforms were less gaudy than the enlisted man's.
With that prologue out of the way I can now go on to say that Wallace Beery is no marine. My God, is he sloppy. His whole presence is one pile of flab upon another. He was fine as the comically sly Long John Silver but as a by-the-book top sergeant, he's plain incredible. It's almost painful, watching him rearrange the manifold dimples and gyri of his face into one or another expression.
The movie, told mostly in flashback, begins in 1941 in the Philippines. Beery's job, as it must be in all such movies, is to bear down on his men and kick them into shape, the Filipino troops included, before he retires. That impending retirement is an event he dreads because he has never won any "battle decorations." He gets his chance. He retires at the proper time but just as he's finding out that inactivity doesn't suit him the Japanese invade the Philippine Islands pari passu. The "bandy legged Nips" and "monkeys" conquer town after town, forcing all the civilians to flee ahead of them. A determined Beery struggles into his dress blue blouse, mobilizes the American and Filipino troops, and stops the enemy long enough for the women and children to escape across the bridge.
They're successful despite the bombs delivered by Japanese airplanes. The Japanese airplanes are dull-colored Vought Vindicators, an obsolete American dive bomber of the period, called disparagingly by pilots the "Vibrator" or "Wind Indicator." The Vindicator also plays itself, when American airplanes rush to the rescue of the beleaguered bridge defenders.
Fans of old movies may enjoy it. There are a lot of familiar names in the cast but you won't notice them on the screen. The kids may get a kick out of it. But it's really made for Saturday afternoons when people went to the movies and didn't really care much about what was on the screen. William Manchester -- historian, journalist, and biographer of John F. Kennedy -- claimed that he was seduced into joining the Marines after seeing the snazzy uniforms in "The Shores of Tripoli." One look at Wallace Beery wrestling to get into his tent-sized blouse, and Manchester would have joined the Coast Guard.
With that prologue out of the way I can now go on to say that Wallace Beery is no marine. My God, is he sloppy. His whole presence is one pile of flab upon another. He was fine as the comically sly Long John Silver but as a by-the-book top sergeant, he's plain incredible. It's almost painful, watching him rearrange the manifold dimples and gyri of his face into one or another expression.
The movie, told mostly in flashback, begins in 1941 in the Philippines. Beery's job, as it must be in all such movies, is to bear down on his men and kick them into shape, the Filipino troops included, before he retires. That impending retirement is an event he dreads because he has never won any "battle decorations." He gets his chance. He retires at the proper time but just as he's finding out that inactivity doesn't suit him the Japanese invade the Philippine Islands pari passu. The "bandy legged Nips" and "monkeys" conquer town after town, forcing all the civilians to flee ahead of them. A determined Beery struggles into his dress blue blouse, mobilizes the American and Filipino troops, and stops the enemy long enough for the women and children to escape across the bridge.
They're successful despite the bombs delivered by Japanese airplanes. The Japanese airplanes are dull-colored Vought Vindicators, an obsolete American dive bomber of the period, called disparagingly by pilots the "Vibrator" or "Wind Indicator." The Vindicator also plays itself, when American airplanes rush to the rescue of the beleaguered bridge defenders.
Fans of old movies may enjoy it. There are a lot of familiar names in the cast but you won't notice them on the screen. The kids may get a kick out of it. But it's really made for Saturday afternoons when people went to the movies and didn't really care much about what was on the screen. William Manchester -- historian, journalist, and biographer of John F. Kennedy -- claimed that he was seduced into joining the Marines after seeing the snazzy uniforms in "The Shores of Tripoli." One look at Wallace Beery wrestling to get into his tent-sized blouse, and Manchester would have joined the Coast Guard.