Good start, but then it gets ruined

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Blistering performances.

. . . of an American Serviceman Holding a Rotten Orange" scene that can be glimpsed during SAVING PRIVATE RYAN's recreation of the Normandy D-Day Invasion. It turns out that these few Micro-seconds of Gruesome Handage are the proverbial "rest of the story" provided by RYAN director Steve Spielberg to the famous ROMEO AND JULIET interchange which begins this Tragic Tale of Woe from 15:28 to 17:08 of STAGE DOOR CANTEEN. Newly Boot-Camped High School Leotard Boy Jack "California" Gilman holds up his chow line in the canteen to dither over an aging stage actress who once played Ms. Capulet. When this seasoned matron gives him a "parting gift" of an orange, Jack vows to keep the perishable citrus fruit on hand till death do them part. Jack's ludicrous pledge festered in Spielberg's imagination for decades, finally germinating into his Stephen King wrinkle along Omaha Beach. Certainly one must hand kudos to Spielberg for verisimilitude here, as Jack's heirloom orange continues to dwarf his Itty Bitty detached Drama Club Appendage even in its withered state. It's too bad that Jack did not have a Real Estate Mogul Daddy to buy a doctor's note giving him a "4F" Get-out-of-the-Draft-Card in War Time due to his under-sized hands, a trick which worked for alleged U.S. President #45.

I loved this film. I actually found it on youtube. Most of the reviews have concentrated on the fact that all those celebrities of the wartime era were seen. And it was indeed lovely to see them especially Katharine Hepburn who was lovely as ever. And the beautiful Merle Oberon.But for me the best part of the movie was the interaction of the soldiers and the girls. And I was especially enthralled by the performances of the little known actor William Terry as Dakota and actress Cheryl Walker as Eileen.This was obviously their one chance to shine in a big movie and I feel they did so magnificently. Indeed without them I don't think there would have been a film at all as you can't just have a movie filled with a bunch of cameo performances.I thought William Terry gave a lovely performance as the gentle Dakota. While Cheryl Walker I thought to be quite brilliant as the self centred Eileen who changes at the end. Indeed there were tears in my eyes at the conclusion. And it was definitely their performances that made the movie for me.

Stage Door Canteen (1943)This is not a great movie as movies go, but if you stick it out, you'll find an amazing parade of great music from the time, played by the real deals, from Benny Goodman to Count Basie. There are some small moments that are treasures, and they will vary depending on who you are. I know I absolutely get choked up in the short recital of Romeo and Juliet with the great Broadway star Katharine Cornell playing Juliet--behind the lunch counter. And there is Katherine Hepburn (at the end), and Yehudi Menuhin (violin and Schubert) and Ray Bolger (he was the Scarecrow four years earlier). There is a really touching moment with a group of Soviet soldiers including a young woman, whose eyes and story are just super sad...but she says, if she meets a Nazi, her "hand will not tremble."The soldiers are such regular guys, all sweetness and loneliness. It's a sad reminder of the war at its most basic--tearing young men from their innocence--and yet of course this is putting the best tilt to it all. These kinds of "canteens" were benefits of sorts, morale boosters, and this movie is a summation of that best of them. Frank Borzage (the director) was top flight a decade early (he did the famous 1932 "Farewell to Arms"), and the photography by Harry Wild (a studio mainstay) is great.Still, it's a canned affair. After an hour of entertainment there's an interlude out on the streets which is weak, and then they are back for more. There are two parallel stories outside the music--the soldiers who are about to go to war, and they are floating around fishing for company, and the women, back stage and in off hours. It's not bad stuff at all.

The wonderful music, the fine entertainment, the inter-personal camaraderie, and the unsure times of the young soldiers heading off into a war from which they may not return, is told with compassion, good clean humor, and passion of the heart. There were at least 4 times during the watching of this film that my wife and I were misty-eyed because of reverence shown. What a moving tribute to our young men who put their lives on the line for us, so that we can enjoy the freedoms we have all come to take for granted. It reminds us that we should all bow our heads daily and pray for our soldiers fighting and dying terrible deaths in foreign lands like these very appreciated men were about to do. What a grand example this film gives us of our country standing shoulder-to-shoulder with our fighting men. We should take this all to heart and put into use this fine example today.