Tonight I watched a movie called "Soldier In The Rain" (1963) starring Steve McQueen and Jackie Gleason. The odd pairing gives a hint that the film might be somewhat unusual, and it is. McQueen stars as a Supply Sergeant stationed at an undisclosed Army base (Ft. Ord was used as the location). He is a hick dimwitted enough to make Gomer Pyle seem like a scholar in comparison. He idolises the Master Sergeant on base - Jackie Gleason - a man of erudition who does the New York Times crossword puzzle in his spare time. Gleason is a true friend. He treats McQueen like an equal. They are the Odd Couple of the base, and are despised by two other men, an MP (Ed Nelson) and another macho Sergeant (Lew Gallo) for no other reason than they are different. McQueen is a goofy Southerner with an exaggerated accent, Gleason is fat and highly intelligent. Neither is what would be considered a standard Army Issue soldier, so the MP hates them both but picks on McQueen because he can get away with it.
The film is a comedy however, complete with a Henry Mancini jazz score that even plays over some of the dialogue. This is definitely a film of it's era, the breezy early 1960s, before that decade got heavy. Much of the film's first hour is devoted to hijinks. McQueen is always scheming on how to get rich. He wants out of the Army and has a plan to make one thousand dollars by winning a photographic contest of Pin-Up Girls. The script meanders, though, and every time you think a thread is going to be developed into a plot point, it melts into another scene instead. This is not a bad quality, in this case, because the story is not about plot but about friendship, and kindness. As I said, it is a unique movie, a story of people who don't fit in.
Sergeant McQueen may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he is unfailingly happy and optimistic. He is outgoing too (and he's Steve McQueen so he's good looking) and all of this makes him popular with the girls. He tries to fix Jackie Gleason up with Tuesday Weld and at first it doesn't go so well, because Gleason is over 40 and heavy set, and Weld is 18, still in high school and even dimmer than McQueen. The three of them attend a fair and the sophisticated Gleason is not amused. He ends up calling Weld an imbecile; she responds by hurling insult after insult directed at his weight. These are brutal to listen to, and I think that only an actor like Jackie Gleason could have pulled off his responses with the philosophical equanimity that he displays here. Weld lets him have it with terrible name calling and he just absorbs it, making minor comments to calm her down. He realises that he brought this reaction out in her by calling her an imbecile and that, despite her youthful beauty and vivacious nature, she is well aware of the cultural and intellectual differences between herself and Gleason's character.
This scene at the fairgrounds, between Weld and Gleason, is a highlight of the movie and it demonstrates what good writing can accomplish in exposing the nuance of human emotion. Here you have a story that has thus far had no plot. You are wondering "what's the movie gonna be about", and then this scene sets everything that came before it into perspective. It is brilliant acting, and the next thing you know, Tuesday Weld is calling Gleason her boyfriend and he has taken her under his wing.
My description doesn't do it justice. It is really very touching, in the context of what began as a comedy.
Steve McQueen has a another friend on base, a Private played by Tony Bill. He is a Spaz who makes McQueen look like a rocket scientist, but he is also a track star and this gives McQueen another get rich quick inspiration. Bill says he can run a three minute mile and McQueen believes him. He starts planning to rent out the Rose Bowl to exhibit Bill's record shattering ability. The money they will make will enable him to retire from the Army when his stint is up. He hopes Gleason will retire with him. This is a movie about friendship after all, and about what friendship really means : people who "get" one another instinctively and who relate to one another naturally, through human chemistry.
I don't think I've ever seen a movie quite like "Soldier In The Rain". Blake Edwards co-scripted, right before he became famous with "The Pink Panther" (also with a Henry Mancini score), and for the first hour or so, you are sure you are looking at a goofy comedy that is almost played as a farce.
But there are those scenes between Gleason and Weld, and there is also the intermittent hovering presence of MP Ed Nelson, who is dying to take these misfits down.
There will be a darker turn to things at some point, but not so much as to radically change the whimsical tone. The feeling will shift from happy-go-lucky to poignant, but again, because the writing is so skillfully developed, these changes feel natural and not contrived.
I went back and read a lot of different fan reviews on IMDB, again just because "Soldier In The Rain" was so different. Almost everyone agreed that Jackie Gleason was brilliant, and I agree. He was a very good dramatic actor, and he is at his best here. Some fans, however, thought that Steve McQueen overacted his performance, and there I disagree. I think it was his caricature of the hick sergeant that set the tone for the farcical comedy that opened the movie, which was needed to contrast the pathos that follows.
Great performances all around, by Gleason, McQueen and Weld, and also Tony Bill.
I give "Soldier In The Rain" Two Huge Thumbs Up, it is a minor classic, you've never seen a movie quite like it. Highly recommended!
I hope you had a great day. I will see you in the morning and I send you love until then.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
No comments:
Post a Comment