The Sailor Takes a Wife

The title is so generic that I thought maybe I had seen it before (maybe I was thinking of "The Lady Takes a Sailor" or "A Girl, a Guy and a Gob"), but none of it rang a bell. It was about a sailor and a girl who meet at some sort of USO club, fall in love, and impulsively marry without bothering to get to know each other first. I have never been big fans of either of its stars, Robert Walker and June Allyson, but I have to say Allyson did a good job in this. She was quite believable as the naive young wife who may be in over her head, and managed to not become too saccharine along the way. She was certainly better than her co-star, whom I found awkward and unpleasant. I'm not at all sure what it was about him that endeared him to 1940's audiences. The only one of his films that used his edgy, just-this-close-to-a-nervous-breakdown vibe was Hitchcock's "Strangers on a Train," certainly not this rom-com.

Anyway, the (mostly) single setting and small cast makes it obvious that it was based on a play. Hume Cronyn is kind of fun as June's nerdy, officious boss, and it's always fun to see "Rochester," but I'm not sure what Audrey Totter was trying to do, and Reginald Owen was in it so briefly he made no impression at all.

This is a very cogent argument for living together a while before marriage!

Robert Walker, very appealing (and extremely skinny looking when we see him chest-up in the bath tub) and June Alyson marry on impulse when he is -- well, he's the sailor and she becomes the wife.

Then he isn't a sailor anymore and they have to live in a large apartment in Greenwich Village, where they learn they have nothing in common and really don't like each other.

She wears her bunny rabbit "jammies" the night of their honeymoon; and really: What man wouldn't be frustrated at that?

The super of the building is Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, whom some tenants seem to call Eddie and some call Harry.

The generally great villain and excellent actress Audrey Totter is wasted in a third-billed role as a Romanian who speaks with an accent sometimes Russian, mostly French,m and, though she wears hats most of the time, appears to be wearing a black wig.

It isn't without charm. But it's ill conceived.

This was June Allyson's first starring role without another big name female like Hedy Lamarr or Lucille Ball sharing top billing. She stars here with Robert Walker as a couple who marry impetuously while WW II is raging. When he's suddenly declared 4F, they have to quickly adjust to each other and married life.

They end up in an empty apartment where nothing works and become immediately ensnared with a conniving Romanian refugee (Audrey Totter) and Allyson's scheming boss (Hume Cronyn) in a series of comic situations. Also on hand is Eddie Anderson as the apartment building's superintendent.

All five stars are in top form. There's also Reginald Owen as a plastics manufacturer and Chester Clute as the bemused nightclub goer. In a way it's like an early version of BAREFOOT IN THE PARK.

There's no cuter housewife than June Allyson in an apron as the sweetest 18-year-old homemaker who takes on the adventures of newlywed life in stride and with pride in her first home!

And there's no way unwed people will relate to the roller-coaster ride that is the 'Marriage Learning Curve' as is delightfully depicted in The Sailor Takes a Wife.

In this adorably cute, albeit dated, tale of WWII era newlyweds, two inexperienced youngsters throw themselves into the experiment of marriage with high ideals that quickly clash with real-life realities which end up creating G-rated slap-stick misunderstandings in a charming cinematic blast from the pro-housewife past!

While the story may seem unrealistic compared to modern times (as if movies packed with promiscuous office romances are now the standard by which to base realism!), the film is full of imaginative scenarios that humorously mirror true-to-life situations that devoted married couples are likely to understand and appreciate:

• unexpected career changes

• an affordable first apartment filled with its own quirks

• seeing your spouse in a different light for the first time

• realizing you don't know everything you thought you knew about your spouse

• being patient with your spouse

• defending and protecting your spouse from prying parties

• forgiving your spouse for unintended accidents

• sticking with your spouse when life doesn't go the way either of you expected

• laughing together through the ups and downs of the Marriage Learning Curve

• and putting the marriage first in the marriage!

I can understand why this movie would be viewed as a farce since Hollywood now programs women (and men!) to believe that home is no place for a woman; and that a woman is meant to be more than 'just' a housewife; and that a woman doesn't have to tolerate a man if he wants her to be a homemaker, or if he loses his job, or if he gets seduced by unscrupulous women.

A woman nowadays may not have to put up with anything she doesn't want to put up with, and that's a woman for you, but that's not a wife.

A wife has responsibilities that an unwed woman doesn't have, and a wife knows her wifely duties come before her womanly wants for the sake of her marriage and her husband; likewise, a husband has the same responsibilities, which sometimes turns marriage into a temporary tug-of-war, but only until both sides realize that winning happens when everyone lets go of the rope and the two sides come together in laughter and love!

The Sailor Takes a Wife is a fun film and an escape to a different time when women were happy to stay at home and swearing wasn't needed to be entertained.

The film could very much benefit from captions/subtitles, which TCM has now sadly removed from their movies when they should be removing the liberal hosts who aren't adding to the quality of the movies but only taking money away from skilled captioners who are the ones who truly make old movies better for everyone.

"Sailor Takes a Wife" is a rare thing--an MGM film that is just terrible. Normally, even their disappointing films from this era are pretty good, as the MGM touch was nearly always box office gold. Most of the reason it's so bad is the writing--and boy is it bad!

When the film begins, an incredibly stupid couple, John and Mary, decide to get married on their first date! Oddly, the star of the film, Robert Walker, did a film with a similar plot--but it turned out to be a gem ("The Clock", 1945). Much of the problem with it this time is that there was no context--you don't see the couple on their date and the sailor isn't about to be shipped overseas like the character in "The Clock". Instead, the couple just come off as impulsive and dumb. And, their dumbness is apparent throughout the film...not just at the beginning.

Oddly, although Mary plans on living without John as he has to report back to his base, the next day John shows up--announcing that he's been discharged for having a bad back. Now the couple who don't even know each other need to somehow work everything out and forge a new marriage. Not surprisingly, there are many kooky complications--few of which are funny.

There are MANY problems with the film other than the dumbness of the couple. There also is a horrid character played by Audrey Totter. While she was a wonderful actress and played wonderful femme fatales, here she is cartoon-like with a silly Romanian accent and over-acting galore. Also wasted are Hume Cronyn and Reginald Owen--good actors who are given one-dimensional writing. The only one who comes off well is Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson, whose double entendres are occasionally funny...and a tad risqué! Overall, a terrible film with badly written characters and a super-contrived plot that never seems the least bit real or interesting.