Ya, ya, mon général!

"Which Way to the Front?" is a hugely disappointing films...even for die-hard Jerry Lewis fans. I personally WANTED to like the movie, as ever since I got to see Lewis in person a few years ago, I have really come to respect and enjoy his films. But no matter what I think of the guy, I cannot in good conscience give this film a positive review because it makes the biggest mistake of any comedy...it's simply not funny. Additionally, the film is set in WWII and looks as if Lewis didn't even bother trying to make the film look as if it was set in the 1940s. The hair, clothing and sets look straight from 1970!

The film COULD have been funny. It seems that the richest man in the world, Brendan Byers (Lewis) wants to fight in WWII but has been declared 4-F. So, he decides to create his own tiny commando unit and he and his men plan on kidnapping a German Field Marshall who looks exactly like Byers. Each member of the team seem about as manly and menacing as a cannoli and one guy (played by baseball star Willie Davis) is black...and they go behind enemy lines dressed as German soldiers.

I mention that it COULD have been funny. The biggest supposed laughs are when Jerry pretends to be the German Field Marshall---and this mostly just consists of him screaming. It looks like a 7 year-old's idea of what a German SHOULD sound like. As for the Japanese, late in the film Jerry dons big teeth and does an impression that is not only racially offensive but cheap and unfunny. But with no real laughs and the men dressed in what look like 1970 Armani uniforms of orange and bright blue, it just comes off as bizarre and ill-conceived. Even Lewis' worst comedy, "Cracking Up" has ONE hilarious scene (aboard the discount airline)..."Which Way to the Front" has nothing...absolutely nothing that will elicit a laugh in anyone. I truly think that if the audience had no idea who Lewis was, they'd think this movie wasn't even supposed to be a comedy! A film best skipped...especially by Lewis fans. It's so unfunny I can understand why Jerry didn't make another starring vehicle for a decade following this one (aside from the never released and reportedly god-awful, "The Day the Clown Cried").

I clearly remember being bereft at the age of about 10 when I read that Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis were splitting up. I think it was my first lesson in the world being cruel, I was truly shocked at that age as these were my comedy heroes. They'd had a string of hits finishing with Pardners and Hollywood or Bust and I just couldn't conceive of a world without Martin & Lewis. Jerry went on to make many comedies which got great acceptance as I remember in Europe, but not so much in the USA. He was regarded as a kind of modern day Chaplin and an acquired taste, mainly due to his obstinance in doing his own thing. This fortunately came to a head with the original Nutty Professor, a truly great comedy. I wish he'd left it there as Which Way To The Front, which I've just viewed is dreadful. An awful script, let down by amateur acting from the so called comedic actors supporting him, a ghastly performance by Jerry himself, screaming for most of it, and in this day and age, politically incorrect to the extreme. I smiled in two or three places and that was it. Best to avoid unless like me, you're a Jerry Lewis completist and just had to watch to the end. It seemed about as long as the second world war in which it was set.

Written by brilliant Monkees' TV writers Gerald Gardner and Dee Caruso,WHICH WAY TO THE FRONT was the last of the "Jerry Lewis" movies until "Hardly Working" almost a decade later. Jerry's comedy is evidently an acquired taste, and admittedly he can occasionally be his own worst enemy when he helms as producer/director--but even in the dreariest of his films, there are always moments of brilliance.

WHICH WAY manages to be amusing,entertaining and yes,quite funny. It is somewhat unlike any of the typical Lewis films.The pace is very upbeat and ther are lots of excellent supporting players--a kind of JERRY DOES HOGANS HEROES.The whole thing looks kind of like an unsold TV pilot and you will either love it or hate it---but hopefully YOU VILL LAUGH

After Which Way To The Front was released Jerry Lewis ceased making films as a star attraction. With a few funny moments involved, there were more eggs laid at this film than a chicken farm on a slow day. It's not a horrible film but it's definitely not among Lewis's best and in the lower tier of his work.

Jerry plays one of the richest men in the world who for some reason I can't fathom wants to serve in the ranks. So it rankles him that he's declared a 4-F something around the time that this film came out many young men would have sold their souls for. As he and three fellow 4-Fs Jan Murray, Steven Franken, and Dack Rambo sit and commiserate about their fate Lewis has a brainstorm. He's rich enough, he'll form his own army and equip it. I will say he designs some snazzy uniforms for his troops which also include his butler John Wood and his chauffeur Willie Davis of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Those flashback sequences involving Murray, Rambo, and Franken are the best part of the film. Even for an audience in the middle of the Vietnam War, those guys all have excellent reasons for wanting to leave their current situations.

Unfortunately the rest of the film isn't as good. The guys train on Lewis's palatial estates, get the best chow any army ever had and then decide on their own mission which is based on Jerry Lewis's resemblance to Field Marshal Kesselring. If you believe their account they actually break the stalemate on the Italian front and later participate in the bomb plot against Hitler.

Hitler was played by Sidney Miller and his scenes with Lewis as Kesselring are taken straight from The Great Dictator. I'm not sure Charlie Chaplin really liked this particular homage.

A lot of World War II film clichés are dealt with here. The coda to this film with Lewis impersonating one of those bucktooth Japanese that were popular at the time I'm not sure was really needed. Nor was it all that funny.

Jerry came up short with this film.

The idea behind "Which Way to the Front" - a millionaire rejected for military service during World War II deciding to form his own army platoon and fight the war his way - is definitely one that is original and has a lot of potential for humor. Unfortunately, the execution here is lacking, to put it kindly. Watching it, I often got the feeling that star and director Jerry Lewis was not trying very hard. For example, while the movie is set in 1943, the movie has a very 1970s feel to it from the costumes to the sets.

A bigger problem is that the movie is simply not that funny, especially in the first half. The movie starts off very slowly, taking both forever to set the situation up and then to get Lewis and his team into the field. And while this is going on, one attempted gag after the other lands with a thud.

The second half of the movie is a bit more successful. There is an injection of serious energy by both Lewis the star and Lewis the director. And this energy does end up generating a few (mild) giggles. (But I certainly didn't laugh at the offensive last scene; you'll see for yourself when you watch the movie.) While there are worse comedies out there (both with or without Lewis), it's easy to see why Warner Brothers only gave the movie a limited release in North America. Though the movie did extremely well in a number of foreign countries, suggesting there's an audience for just about any movie.