Classic Review: Operation Petticoat

Naturally, I had to review a favorite movie of mine first. :-) Operation Petticoat is a 1959 comedy film with Tony Curtis and Cary Grant. Those are two favorite actors of mine, Curtis from Some Like It Hot, which I saw not long before Operation Petticoat, and Cary Grant from The Awful Truth (btw I'll be reviewing both movies in different posts.)

Operation Petticoat deals with a Navy captain (Cary Grant in all his silver fox hotness) aboard this submarine that has the loudest and funniest engine I've ever heard. The thing backfires and creaks like the opening from a scary movie or something. Hilarity. Well when he boards a new captain (Tony Curtis) comes aboard, and it comes out that he's quite the ladykiller--not hard to see, Tony Curtis was almost too easy on the eyes--he knows he's gonna have a hard time with him. He gets his bunkmates into some mess, like pulling a poker night on one of the dock sites to get more supplies, taking a group of pregnant natives aboard during a time that the island was getting bombed, but most notably stealing a pig. The explanation of that incident in itself caused alot of giggles. In addition to the lawd-awful sound the submarine makes, due to a paint problem the submarine gets repainted in pink. That alone is too funny once you see it. The sub gets under way, and at their next dock point the captain is told that their new bunkmates are going to be a group of female nurses, much to Grant's dismay.

Of course, for any group of males confined to tight quarters with no female contact at all, they were extremely pleased with the news but Grant's character seems less sure of it, and rightfully so--a particular klutzy nurse in the bunch ends up causing him some trouble, accidentally putting her cigarette out in his coffee, shooting off a missile and blowing up a truck, and Grant's character sits on her curling iron, burning his bum, and a slip caused her to blow off a missile incorrectly, hitting a military truck. lol They ended up getting bombed by friendly fire because there was nothing to identify the sub as an American ship.

I don't want to say everything that happened in the movie for those who haven't seen it, but it's a good movie to watch if dry wit, sarcasm and hijinks are your thing. The casting was excellent for the plot, comedic timing was on point, and it provided a lighter alternative to the now-classic war movies from that era. So if you still like a little military action in your movies but don't want something heavy to digest, I think Operation Petticoat is for you.