Pardon My Sarong (1942)
After making their first film for MGM, Abbott and Costello returned to Universal and made Pardon My Sarong, their first Universal film made without director Arthur Lubin, who had directed all of their Universal films since Buck Privates. Unfortunately, the results are not too good.
Abbott and Costello are Algy Shaw and Wellington Pflug, two former bus drivers who find themselves joining the crew of boat racer Tommy Layton (Robert Paige). When Joan Marshall (Virginia Bruce) fires his crew in order to help her brother win, Layton takes her along. The four eventually find themselves stranded on an island where they encounter island natives and a suspicious scientist (Lionel Atwill).
Let’s start with the positives. There is a great sequence at the beginning featuring Abbott and Costello being chased by a cop played by William Demarest. They go backstage to where a magician is setting up his act and use his props in order to escape the cop. It’s a really funny sequence and is definitely the highlight of the film.
There’s also an impressive dance number by a group called Tip Tap & Toe as well as some entertaining musical numbers by a vocal group called the Ink Spots.
I’d like to note that these scenes all take place towards the beginning of the film, because once they’re over, the movie goes downhill fast. For one thing, the story does not have a strong focus. The boat race is the most important objective at first and even when they’re on the island, the objective is to get back in the race. We never get to see the end of the race, though. The characters come across this volcano scheme, foil it, and then...that’s it. The movie just kind of ends, implying you’ll see the end of the race, but you never do. Was this movie trying to hint at a possible sequel?
The romantic interests are dull. Virginia Bruce is clearly trying her best, but she’s just not given much to work with. Not once throughout this film was there any emotional connection between the two romantic leads. With the previous films, they tried with varying degrees of success to make you care about these characters. Here, they didn’t even try at all; I’m still not entirely sure if they even like each other at all at the end, even though I’m pretty sure they were trying to imply that. None of the romantic scenes ever go anywhere and the only positive thing I can say about them is that they’re short.
Unfortunately, Abbott and Costello don’t really help much either. Although there are a couple slightly amusing sequences involving a tree and a poisoned drink, respectively, in general they don’t have very good material this time around. As a matter of fact, Abbott is really unlikeable in this film. There’s one sequence where he tries to convince the island chief that Costello would be a perfect choice for going up to the volcano that no one ever came back from, and there’s an especially horrifying sequence in which Abbott hands Costello a gun and convinces him that he should commit suicide! I’m not acting as though Abbott has been a saint in all the previous films, but this is beyond low.
The whole island aspect has also dated badly and the song sequences on the island are really tedious. Although it does go a long while without song sequences, suddenly there are numbers almost right by each other that further enforce the tediousness of them.
Another dud for Universal. Thankfully, if memory serves me right, they improved drastically with their next effort.
4 out of 10
Abbott and Costello are Algy Shaw and Wellington Pflug, two former bus drivers who find themselves joining the crew of boat racer Tommy Layton (Robert Paige). When Joan Marshall (Virginia Bruce) fires his crew in order to help her brother win, Layton takes her along. The four eventually find themselves stranded on an island where they encounter island natives and a suspicious scientist (Lionel Atwill).
Let’s start with the positives. There is a great sequence at the beginning featuring Abbott and Costello being chased by a cop played by William Demarest. They go backstage to where a magician is setting up his act and use his props in order to escape the cop. It’s a really funny sequence and is definitely the highlight of the film.
There’s also an impressive dance number by a group called Tip Tap & Toe as well as some entertaining musical numbers by a vocal group called the Ink Spots.
I’d like to note that these scenes all take place towards the beginning of the film, because once they’re over, the movie goes downhill fast. For one thing, the story does not have a strong focus. The boat race is the most important objective at first and even when they’re on the island, the objective is to get back in the race. We never get to see the end of the race, though. The characters come across this volcano scheme, foil it, and then...that’s it. The movie just kind of ends, implying you’ll see the end of the race, but you never do. Was this movie trying to hint at a possible sequel?
The romantic interests are dull. Virginia Bruce is clearly trying her best, but she’s just not given much to work with. Not once throughout this film was there any emotional connection between the two romantic leads. With the previous films, they tried with varying degrees of success to make you care about these characters. Here, they didn’t even try at all; I’m still not entirely sure if they even like each other at all at the end, even though I’m pretty sure they were trying to imply that. None of the romantic scenes ever go anywhere and the only positive thing I can say about them is that they’re short.
Unfortunately, Abbott and Costello don’t really help much either. Although there are a couple slightly amusing sequences involving a tree and a poisoned drink, respectively, in general they don’t have very good material this time around. As a matter of fact, Abbott is really unlikeable in this film. There’s one sequence where he tries to convince the island chief that Costello would be a perfect choice for going up to the volcano that no one ever came back from, and there’s an especially horrifying sequence in which Abbott hands Costello a gun and convinces him that he should commit suicide! I’m not acting as though Abbott has been a saint in all the previous films, but this is beyond low.
The whole island aspect has also dated badly and the song sequences on the island are really tedious. Although it does go a long while without song sequences, suddenly there are numbers almost right by each other that further enforce the tediousness of them.
Another dud for Universal. Thankfully, if memory serves me right, they improved drastically with their next effort.
4 out of 10
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