U.S.S. Teakettle

Financially it didn't do well as U.S.S. Teakettle, so Fox Studios, with a rare perception that strikes home to the very core of trouble, changed the title to the imaginative, if less relevant, You're in the Navy Now. It was still no box office bargain. All of which goes to prove that a highly amusing picture failing under one name will be equally amusing and unloved under another. Or maybe people actually prefer television.

Anyway, it is a good picture, and no one laughs very hard at the best of titles, one way or another. The part that matters is a light farce, leaning toward sophisticated pratfalls rather than clever dialogue. The basic plot leaves much room for the actors to develop laughs, featuring a crew of "ninety day wonders" who are testing a subchaser that sports a new type steam eingine possessed of a flair for the dramatic. Shanghaied from the Mr. Roberts set, the crew does nothing new, but does it well; the engine is obviously the American branch of the same mechanical family that spawned the device in The Man in the White Suit. Led by Eddie Albert and Jack Webb, the officers are variations on the theme of Ensign Pulver, and Millard Mitchell plays the "regular navy" chief bosun in the regular Hollywood manner.

Starring as the reactivated reserve skipper, Gary Cooper is probably the best thing about the picture. In his usual--and favorite--role of Gary Cooper, he is quite at home on the bridge of his handy little ship. Wind whistles past his high cheekbones and salt spray lashes up to be-white his nautical brow as his first command is towed home by a Sancho Panza-type tug. His eighth failure to complete a test run has again resulted in burst boilers. The tug flashes a signal, and after the scant minutes his singal officer takes to decipher the more code, Cooper hurls back the answer, "No"--he would not prefer the cover of night to skulk into port. And so it goes.

I do not mean to condemn the picture by pointing out that it is not particularly new. It isn't, but if you liked Mr. Roberts and the gizmo seenes in White Suit, and especially if you like Gary Cooper, You're in the Navy Now (nee Teakettle) is a fine, funny picture. I like all three.