Word: sternly
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Francis (Universal-International) is the name of a talented Army mule (already celebrated in David Stern's 1946 comic novel) who not only talks but makes more sense than the whole chain of command. By confiding Japanese secrets to a bewildered Burma campaign shavetail (Donald O'Connor), Francis throws the enemy for a loss and the U.S. brass into a tizzy...
...leaden for fantasy, the movie is mulishly slow, and so prone to linger on the obvious that for a while it barely makes the grade as comedy. Not content to have Francis show up his military superiors, Author-Scripter Stern lets the mule go on haranguing them as well. But in its best scenes, the picture kicks up enough fun to numb a tolerant moviegoer to its shortcomings. Actor O'Connor makes an amiable nitwit, and Francis (voice by horse opera's Chill Wills) is a tribute to the patience and technical skill of moviemaking...
Harry Byrd was not on the Senate floor when Freshman Humphrey first discharged his matchlock. But last week Byrd planted himself firmly behind his desk, flipped open a manuscript on the lectern before him and fixed the upstart with a cold, stern eye. After glancing through the Congressional Record, he began, he had found at least nine major misstatements in Humphrey's 2,000-word accusation. He would proceed forthwith to set the Senate straight on the facts...
...flames. Like many another skipper, Sherman had long before figured out just what he would do if he "caught a fish." In an inferno of smoke and exploding ammunition, he maneuvered his ship so that the flames blew away from the hull, backed her stern clear of the flaming, gasoline-covered water. Sherman was the last man to leave. He was burned, and badly shaken up by depth charges while he was in the water; 193 of his men were dead. But through the lane he had cleared off the stern, 2,054 had swum to safety...
...Down to Sleep (adapted by Elaine Ryan from Ludwig Bemelmans' novel; produced by Nancy Stern & George Nichols 3rd) strongly suggests that the printed page is Ludwig Bemelmans' proper habitat. It certainly is for Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep: the journey from book to stage winds up much more baggage than Bemelmans. Moreover, any show calling for 13 lavish scenes, 50 frenzied characters, a tropical earthquake and the billowing Atlantic Ocean also calls for a composer and a choreographer...