Just watched again this, the third of the "war musicals" I'm reviewing for these next few days of which Something for the Boys and Thank Your Lucky Stars were the first two, having seen This is the Army previously during the summer of 1987 on USA Network and again several years later on a Diamond Home Video VHS tape. With the Warner Bros. DVD providing a much better print than the last couple times I've seen this, I managed to have a much better time watching it. In fact, the only times I've cringed were during the blackface "Mandy" number (though the dances-led by Gene Kelly's brother Fred-were enjoyable) and during the "Stage Door Canteen" sketch where we get lame banter of one man dressed as Lynn Fontaine and another as her husband Alfred Lunt, not to mention having another man impersonating European thespians praising the hamburger. Otherwise, this movie had mostly enjoyable comedy especially whenever Alan Hale, Sr.-who is very much like his "Skipper" son in lovable blustery-is on screen, drama with Lt. Ronald Reagan and Joan Leslie debating the merits of marrying before leaving for battle, and musical highlights-like when Kate Smith sings her stirring and iconic rendition of "God Bless America" or even when composer Irving Berlin makes his entrance in his old uniform singing "Oh, How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" (not to mention an additional song filmed exclusively for English audiences called "My British Buddy" which is an extra on the disc). And the number "That's What the Well-Dressed Man in Harlem Will Wear" isn't all that offensive concerning the African-American performers though I don't think it really was necessary to have boxer Sgt. Joe Louis in this as he just punches a bag during it. All in all, this was a rousingly patriotic show that really delivered. P.S. I have to note that co-screenwriter Capt. Claude Binyon came from my birthtown of Chicago, Ill. And when I first watched this, during the commercials, I switched to other channels and saw live coverage of President Reagan and his wife Nancy consoling various people on the death of loved ones. I'm guessing this was related to the event of May 17 of that year (two days before I graduated from Belaire High School) when 37 American sailors were killed on the U.S.S. Stark after it was set afire by two missiles from an Iraqi airplane. Talk about coincidence...
