Wake Me When It's Over (1960)

Director:

Mervyn LeRoy

Writers:

Richard L. Breen (writer)
Howard Singer (novel)

Release Date:

10 June 1960 (West Germany)

Genre:

Comedy

Plot Keywords:

Hotel | Military | Beautiful Woman | Beer | Based On Novel

Cast

Ernie Kovacs	...	Capt. Charlie Stark
Dick Shawn	...	Gus Brubaker
Margo Moore	...	Lt. Nora McKay
Jack Warden	...	Captain Dave 'Doc' Farrington
Nobu McCarthy	...	Ume Tanaka (as Nobu Atsumi McCarthy)
Don Knotts	...	Sgt. Percy Warren
Robert Strauss	...	Sgt. Sam Weiscoff
Noreen Nash	...	Marge Brubaker
Parley Baer	...	Col. Archie Hollingsworth
Robert Emhardt	...	Joab Martinson
Marvin Kaplan	...	Hap Cosgrove
Tommy Nishimura	...	Pvt. Jim Harigawa
Raymond Bailey	...	Gen. Weigang
Robert Burton	...	Col. Dowling
Frank Behrens	...	Maj. Bigelow

Runtime:

126 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

Finland:S

Company:

Mervyn LeRoy Productions Inc.

Quotes:

Gus Brubaker: In the meantime, is there anyone in the village who speaks English?
Capt. Charlie Stark: Nah, them little guys got the wrong kind of bridgework.
Gus Brubaker: Well, we're gonna need a Japanese to front for us at the desk.
Capt. Charlie Stark: I got it! Harigawa.
[calling]
Capt. Charlie Stark: Hey, Mushy! Mushy! Mushy, you're gonna be the desk clerk.
Gus Brubaker: There's nothing to it! You just greet the guests in Japanese.
Pvt. Jim Harigawa: What's from this Japanese? I don't know none.
Capt. Charlie Stark: Well, what's the use of being Japanese if you can't say any Japanese?
Pvt. Jim Harigawa: I'm from Brooklyn! I don't know nothin' about this cockamamie language. So how about a little Yiddish?

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Inventing the Abbotts (1997)

Soundtrack:

Wake Me When It's Over

Delicious writing and acting

I've not read the Howard Singer novel, but seeing this film is going to send me straight to the library for it. I watched this on a whim, because I wanted to see an Ernie Kovacs film performance different from his turn in "Bell, Book, and Candle." The cast in this film--from Kovacs, to newcomer Dick Shawn, to the marvelous Marvin Kaplan, to a wonderfully subdued Jack Warden--is top-notch, and the writing is just splendid. The film takes on military bureaucracy, sexual mores, international relations, postwar backlash, and mixes it all up with the sort of hijinks that Sergeant Bilko was best known for. It's sheer delight.

Shawn is the victim of a bureaucratic snafu: listed as dead after having spent 2 years in a German P.O.W. camp, the Air Force decides to issue him a new serial number instead of reinstating his old one, then discharges him the next day. As a result, with only one day's service on his record, Shawn is re-drafted 7 years after his official discharge, and stationed on the remote Japanese island of Shima, where the hostile inhabitants still have a shrine to a downed Japanese plane.

The air base C.O. is a cavalier flyboy, played by Ernie Kovacs, with the only other real authority being the doctor, played by Jack Warden. The 100 men stationed there are bored out of their skulls (Don Knotts has a nice turn as the activities counselor), and with Shawn's arrival a plot is hatched to keep the men occupied, improve local relations, and dispose of a great deal of G.I. surplus material.

The movie is a little on the long side, and the subplot with the female lieutenant seems a little forced, but the action and snappy dialogue will keep you engrossed throughout.

Sadly, this film is not available on VHS or DVD, which is a crying shame. Watch for it on television; you won't regret it.