The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Doughboys (1930)

Another Buster Keaton MGM talkie, one that happily continues my trend of “really not all that bad.”  It’s a bit like Speak Easily, a decent-ish, unremarkable film.  Though it has a few memorable scenes, its chief sin is that it squanders its biggest asset:  Buster.

If the name didn’t give it away, Doughboys is a World War I comedy (probably not many of those.)  Buster plays Elmer J. Stiverson, a less memorable echo of his rich dandies in The Navigator, Battling Butler, and The Saphead.  Trying to secure a new chauffeur, Elmer mistakes the recruiting office for the employment bureau and accidently enlists.  The silver lining is that Mary, the girl he loves, is there as well, entertaining the troops.  Even better, while she turned up her nose at him back home, her opinion has improved now that he’s a brave soldier going off to fight for freedom.  Now if only they can make it to France and back in one piece.

The Good – Although Elmer isn’t as funny or well-characterized as Rollo in The Navigator or Alfred in Battling Butler, he’s a great improvement over the dopes in Free and Easy and Parlor, Bedroom and Bath.  What’s more, he’s fairly resourceful and proactive; he holds his ground against his sneering drill sergeant and even plays a pretty clever joke on him.  It’s great to see Buster again playing someone who can make things happen in his own story.  I’m also a fan of Mary, who might be my favorite MGM love interest so far.  She’s cool and gorgeous, and she and Elmer have sweet chemistry together.  I like the nods to Buster’s own military service, like Elmer’s ill-fitting uniform (he looks like a 14-year-old in his dad’s suit,) and there are a few standout moments.  There’s a great scene of Elmer singing and playing the ukulele with some fellow soldiers that’s a lot of fun, and Buster’s wonderfully acrobatic performance as an impromptu drag act in the company show is a riot.  Some of the dancing in this scene is  reminiscent of his dance with Fatty Arbuckle in Back Stage, and it’s made even more fun by Elmer’s attempts to extricate himself from the situation.  A great sequence, and very Buster.

The Bad – As perfect and hilarious as Buster’s tumbling is in the drag routine, there’s far too little of it.  This film is woefully short on physical comedy, and what little there is mostly features Elmer tripping unimpressively over things, with none of the eye-catching twists, flips, and rolls that Buster does so well.  Quick example –in the recruiting office, Elmer resists taking his clothes off for the physical, and the military doctor has to forcibly strip him.  Amusing, but over in… maybe thirty seconds?  A handful of years later, Buster reused this idea for the short General Nuisance, and the half-clothed scuffle that results is hysterical.  Here, though?  Hardly anything.  Additionally, Elmer and Mary’s cute dynamic is hampered by tired misunderstanding-based conflicts.  More than anything, though, it’s just a bland movie.  It’s not hugely funny – for the most part, the comedy only elicits bemused chuckles (the physical comedy in the drag scene being the major exception, because that’s simply outstanding.)  It’s just there, nothing special.  Given Buster’s incredible comic talents, he’s wasted in this okay-but-unmemorable film.

The Ugly – Really, there’s nothing to report here, and that’s nice.  Although the film itself is too staid to merit a lot of praise, it’s a relief to see Buster in an MGM movie without any cringe-worthy moments.  This is perhaps the reason it was Buster’s favorite from this period; even though he has more comedic material in, say, Parlor, Bedroom and Bath or Speak Easily, there’s nothing in it that feels like it was specifically included to humiliate him or break his spirit.  Yay?