BUCK PRIVATES

New Zealand Listener, Volume 5, Issue 108, 18 July 1941, Page 17

BUCK PRIVATES

(Universal)

» when I come across a film such as this I feel that our little friend on the left here would be more correctly interpreting my feel-

ings if he simply sat back and laughed, without bothering to clap. Buck Privates I found thoroughly enjoyable and an excellent sample of its own particular class of entertainment-if you are in a mood to be easily amused, I happened to be in such a mood and the rest of the audience seemed to be in similar case. Apart from the fact that Buck Privates appears to be the first comedy of life in the U.S. army since neutrality began to be spelt non-belligerency, there is nothing in the show to distinguish it from a long line of predecessors. There is nothing new in it, the gags are ancient and the situations, from the time the comedians find they have inadvertently enlisted until the fade-out, have been used dozens of times before and will be used as often again. But it has all the perennial attraction of good farce. I laughed heartily, though I found it dificult when I got home to recall what I had been laughing about, At the same time, Bud Abbott and Lou Costello, who are the principals, show themselves to be slick comedians in the best vaudeville tradition, and for those who enjoy the harmonising of the Andrews Sisters, the inclusion of these vocalists in the cast will no doubt constitute an additional attraction. Buck Privates left me with the feeling that while there might be nothing great about it there was something fairly good in the recipe somewhere. ‘