Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

One of my all time favorites.

Better Late Then Never

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Woodrow Truesmith (Eddie Bracken) is drinking away his sorrows over being dismissed from the Marines before seeing any action for chronic hay fever. He's scared to go home as a failure. He buys drinks for a group of marines with no money. Sergeant Heffelfinger served with his legendary dead hero father. The guys make up a lie about Woodrow that he's a wounded hero so that he could go home to his mother. They are shocked that the lie gets out of hand and town throws him a hero's homecoming. His girlfriend Libby had gotten engaged to the mayor's son Forrest Noble who was also refused military service for chronic hay fever. She tries to break the news to Woodrow. The town pushes him to run for mayor.Preston Sturges reunites with Eddie Bracken, William Demarest, and others for a second movie in 1944. It has his trademark machine-gun dialogue fun and the screwball comedy. Preston is once again throwing some sharp jabs at hero worship of the military. He's pushing the envelop with the wartime censorship board. It's daring for its times and its quality stands the test of time. It's highly entertaining and makes a point.

One of the things I liked about Hail The Conquering Hero is the fact it got made at all during World War II America. The idea of a man medically discharged from the Marines passing himself off as the great hero from Guadalcanal, even at the behest of some Marines he meets in a bar is ludicrous on its face. But by golly Preston Sturges pulled it off.Think about it, within a year of the end of World War II a genuine 4F with no pretense about it would be a great American hero in Frank Capra's It's A Wonderful Life. In the end both George Bailey and Woodrow Pershing Lafayette Truesmith would be the saviors of their respective small towns.Generally however a military record of some kind was going to be a necessity in politics after World War II. Hubert H. Humphrey had a legitimate draft deferment and was Mayor of Minneapolis during the latter part of World War II. But his lack of war record contrasted badly in running for president against John F. Kennedy in 1960.Sturges realized that it's the integral part of his satire of small town life and politics. Certain forces within Eddie Bracken's town would like to use his new found celebrity status to make him mayor to unseat bloviating Raymond Walburn at his bloviating best on screen. Ideas about how to govern get real lost in the political process, the same way they do in Sturges's first real success, The Great McGinty.Bracken who after Sturges left Paramount gradually slipped back in the ranks of supporting players is in the hands of the director who knew how to utilize his schnook persona the best. Poor Bracken is the posthumous son of a World War I Marine hero who died at Belleau Wood and those were the first Americans in combat in that war. When the second World War comes, he enlists hoping to emulate his late father whose unseen presence was felt growing up.But he's washed out due to hay fever and can't face coming home and disappoint sweetheart Ella Raines, mother Georgia Caine, and aunt Elizabeth Patterson. He buys a round at a bar for some returning Marines from the Pacific led by William Demarest who knew his father back in the day. The Marines cheer him up and Demarest gets the bright idea of passing him off as a great war hero, discharged due to battle wounds. They accompany Bracken back to his home and his political 'career' mushrooms from there.Hail The Conquering Hero earned Preston Sturges a nomination for Best Original Screenplay and he was up against himself in that category for Miracle At Morgan's Creek. His films canceled each other out and Wilson won the Oscar in 1944 in that category.You know if they had succeeded in pulling this off, I do wonder how Bracken might have done trying to get Veteran's benefits later on.But Hail The Conquering Hero is Preston Sturges at his best.

What makes a hero? That's the essential question being addressed by this movie which is, at one and the same time, both a funny piece of escapism for a war-weary population and a very thought-provoking study of heroism.Eddie Bracken is Woodrow Truesmith, son of a World War I Marine and grandson of a Civil War veteran. Given his family history, Woodrow is, of course, expected to serve honourably in World War II but when he goes to enlist he's rejected for chronic hayfever. Unable to bring himself to tell his mother the news, he tells her he's been sent overseas. One day he meets a group of real Marines (headed by Sgt. Heppelfinger, played very well by William Demarest) and shares his story. They arrange to take him home and have him pose as a veteran of Guadalcanal. I admittedly had some trouble with the plot. From what I know of the Marines, I doubt they'd take kindly to someone posing as a veteran of Marine battles, let alone set the whole thing up. That aside, however, once Woodrow gets home with his new Marine buddies the story takes on a life of its own. Woodrow is suddenly portrayed as a great hero. He's met by bands and given the keys to the city by the typical movie version of the small town mayor (Raymond Walburn). Then the town decides to erect a monument in his memory. Then, the opponents to the mayor draft him to run against the mayor. One lie leads to another, and Woodrow can't get out of it. In the meantime, his re-appearance in town causes emotional angst for his former girlfriend Libby (Ella Raines) who's now engaged to be married to the mayor's son, but who really still loves Woodrow.It's fascinating to watch a little lie take on a life of its own and grow beyond anyone's wildest imagination. It's also interesting to watch Woodrow's torment. He knows he's no Marine hero, but no one will let him out of the story. Every time he tries to explain, he gets shouted down by those who don't want the truth; they just want to live with the hero image. Eventually, though, Woodrow becomes a hero. Here's where the study of heroism comes in. Heroes in wartime are usually those who fight the battles and kill the enemy. Woodrow never did that, but his heroism will ultimately be defined not by wartime battles, but by honesty and integrity and a real courage, as - in a powerful scene near the end of the movie - he faces the town's citizens and finally tells all, admitting the deception in such a way as to let the town know he's no hero, but that will also protect the reputation of the Marines who got him into this in the first place.This is a very good movie featuring a fine story and a collection of excellent performances. It should definitely be watched. 7/10

Curiously enough, while I do admire and enjoy most of Sturges' films, I've never been quite as taken with him as his reputation would seem to demand. Nevertheless, I fully acknowledge his standing as one of the most important figures in Comedy.The thing is that, having started off as a writer (like his contemporary Billy Wilder), Sturges' peerless talent in this department kind of swamps his technical side (which is boldly integrated into the comedies of Frank Capra whereas it's more refined, but still palpable, in those of Ernst Lubitsch) – so that his films come across as undeniably erudite (which, however, clashes at times with their small-town settings and working-class characters) but also a bit loquacious! For me, the best comedy director remains Howard Hawks – in whose work the form not only appears effortless but is actually made to transcend genre (thus acquiring an artistry without resorting to undue camera gymnastics or editorial tricks). What Sturges' films may have lacked besides was that he rarely worked with bona-fide stars; instead, he amassed an enviable repertory of character actors around him and then let them rip – with the consequence that most of his canon emerges to be undisciplined and tiresomely frenetic! Anyway, after that rambling introduction, let's get down to the issue at hand: HAIL THE CONQUERING HERO can surely be counted among Sturges' finest. As were all of his films, it's an absolute original but also somewhat audacious (his previous outing, THE MIRACLE OF MORGAN'S CREEK [1944], had tackled an even more outrageous and controversial theme) – this being a wartime comedy about the put-down of hero-worship! The plot sees milquetoast hero Eddie Bracken rejected for war duty because of hay fever; not wanting to break his mother's heart (his father was a hero of the previous war, incidentally), he only returns home after a year. He meets up with six marines on leave (the Sergeant among them happens to have served with Bracken's father) and they contrive to get him a hero's reception, thinking that all will blow over once they're there. However, the whole town shows up to greet him at the station with due fanfare – he's clearly embarrassed at this, but the soldiers persuade him to go along with the ruse for the time being. The situation escalates further when the town decides to erect a statue in Bracken's honor and, eventually, pushes him into an electoral campaign for the Mayor's seat! There's a predictably upbeat ending, following a Capraesque speech in which Bracken confesses the truth about his 'war record', where the people decide they still want him because – for once – they've been faced with an honest declaration!! Eddie Bracken may have had too limited a range to make it as a comic genius in the Bob Hope mold, but he certainly fit the Preston Sturges universe (characteristically, he's given an unwieldy – and ironic – name here). Leading the Sturges stock company is William Demarest as the fixer of a Sergeant who lands Bracken in more trouble with every new scheme to aid his 'case' (a memorable scene early on sees him attempting to trade service at a café with a collection of war 'mementos', only to have the owner turn out to be even more supplied with such worthless trinkets than he is!). Other members include typically well-meaning but perennially flustered Franklin Pangborn (his efforts to organize multiple bands at Bracken's reception are continually frustrated through lack of cooperation or outright incompetence from those concerned), Raymond Walburn (as the pompous and unpopular current mayor – whose similarly insensitive offspring is naturally engaged to Dad's secretary, the lovely Ella Raines) and, in smaller roles, Al Bridge, Jimmy Conlin and Torben Meyer.Raines herself – whom I'd only seen in film noirs – gets quite a well-rounded character (though her longing for a homespun life alongside Bracken feels decidedly idealized). Also notable is ex-boxing champ Freddie Steele, playing an orphaned soldier who finds in Bracken's mother a surrogate parent – often berating him (both verbally and physically) for what he deems Bracken's inconsiderate behavior towards her! This subplot introduces an element of sentimentality into the fray, which usually bothers me, but it was quite amusing here to see a big man like Steele go soft every so often.I should be getting soon to Sturges' most misunderstood film, THE GREAT MOMENT (1944), which would then leave me with only his little-seen directorial swan song – THE FRENCH, THEY ARE A FUNNY RACE aka THE DIARY OF MAJOR THOMPSON (1955) – to catch up with from his brief but highly individualistic oeuvre...