515 - Pardon My Sarong, United States, 1942. Dir. Erle C. Kenton.
Algy and Wellington are driving a bus.
The only problem is that their own bus company does not know where they are.
It seems as though they have gone off the grid. Off the map. Out of contact.
Celebrity bachelor Tommy Layton rides aboard the bus. Along with his cadre of ladies. He has hired the pair of drivers to take him cross country, from Chicago to Los Angeles, where he will board his yacht and race a race to Hawaii.
If only Algy and Wellington were not so incompetent.
They stop at a gas station to fill up the bus. But they do not have the money to pay for it, and Tommy is not paying. The total is $12.50. He does give them a $20. But one of the girls takes the money back from Wellington's hand as she reboards.
So they do a routine. Abbott and Costello movies always make room for routines. And songs. And dances. People do not always think of them as musical comedies, but so far all of them have been.
Detective Kendall is sent by the bus company to track down the bus and arrest the two drivers who have absconded with it.
Detective Kendall is played by William Demarest. We could watch any movie with him in it.
He chases them into the backstage of a magic show, and in a series of gags, he interacts with the real magician, and then Algy, and then Wellington, and then chases them both through the magic tricks until he finally captures them.
Back on the bus, he orders Wellington to drive back to the station where he can book them. But somehow Wellington ends up parked on a moving ferry. Not knowing they are moving, Kendell orders him to back up.
He does.
They wind up at the bottom of the river.
Watching William Demarest emerge from a submerged bus below water--presumably a studio tank--and swim to the surface in a three-piece suit, brings back good memories.
Once I booked a role in a commercial for an insurance company where business people competed in a triathlon. In their suits. We ran, biked, and swam. In the Pacific ocean. I came up out of the ocean onto Coronado Island off San Diego and ran onto the beach, wearing a suit, tie, dress shoes, and watch, and carrying a briefcase, and continued to sprint to the finish line. It was one thing to ruin a nice new suit on someone else's dime. But those shoes! They were fine quality. The watch, meanwhile, was waterproof.
So Kendell surfaces and rejoins the ferry, but we lose him as we cut to Tommy Layton, now aboard his yacht, having had it boarded by his female competitor, Joan Marshall, who has boarded his boat and fired his crew. When he discovers it, he hires her on the spot to take their place.
And when he weighs anchor, he pulls up Algy and Wellington. Out of the sea. Now they too will be his makeshift crew.
Which means they will steer off course.
Get them lost at sea.
And get them on an uncharted desert isle.
The island is inhabited by natives, who make Wellington a hero and commit him to marry the chief's daughter Luana--to be fought by her former suitor, a very large man. And it is inhabited by a faux scientist, Dr. Varnoff, who is really there with his cronies to manipulate the natives into stealing their precious jewels.
This new band of sea suckers is thwarting his plans.
It all comes to a head when Wellington is chosen to climb up to the sacred temple to offer himself as the ultimate sacrifice. And Dr. Varnoff's cronies are waiting to kidnap him secretly. After having tied up Tommy and Joan.
How will they get out of this jam?
The film features the singing performances of The Four Ink Spots and the dancing performances of Tip, Tap, and Toe.
They have nothing to do with the plot, but they steal the show. Tip, Tap, and Toe are three men who dance on a table top. A small table top. Which has been waxed. And they both tap and slide. One at a time, and then all together. The lead man slides in such a way that he appears to do a one-legged moonwalk. Forty years before Michael Jackson. He also does the full splits. On the table top. And on the floor after jumping high off the table top. These men have a style of tap that seems unique to them. It is of a high quality. Athletic. And impressive.
The film also features a seal. Sharky the Seal. Played by Charley the Seal. Because all movies are improved by a lovable animal.
The bus company superintendent is played by Charles Lane. The one man in Hollywood history who may have appeared in more movies than William Demarest.
We have seen William Demarest in a film before. In The Lady Eve.
310 - The Lady Eve, 1941.
www.realbillbillions.blogspot.com/2017/11/310-lady-eve-united-states-1941-dir.html
And we have seen both William Demarest and Charles Lane before, in the movie nearly everyone was in, It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.
038 - It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, 1963.
www.realbillbillions.blogspot.com/2017/02/038-its-mad-mad-mad-mad-world-1963.html
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