I saw this movie before reading any reviews, and I thought it was very funny. I was very surprised to see the overwhelmingly negative reviews this film received from critics.

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

The acting in this movie is really good.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Apparently I must be the only one that loves this movie and everything about it. As a child I watched nothing but musicals and I had many favorites. They didn't all have to be perfect but each one was very special to me in their own unique way. "Skirts Ahoy" is one of my all time top favorites and I use to watch it over and over. I use to entertain everyone with my quotes and humorous reenactments of the musical scenes. "Skirts Ahoy" stood out to me as different from the rest and to me there was something very special about it. I think there is so much humor in this movie and a very real side of relationships and life lessons. This movie is very dear to my heart and I haven't seen it in so long. For everyone that dislikes this movie, please let me know if it is ever on TV and I will be happy as a clam to sit and enjoy every second of it while everyone else goes to bed ;)

Shirts Ahoy 1952 doesn't have the kind of excitement like other musicals from MGM. The crisp singing numbers are not there at all. The only bright spot of the entire film is when Debbie Reynolds and Bobby Van perform. The actors in this film are very dull in acting, dancing, and singing. The camera shots are also poor. The casting of this film should had more big time musical stars than just one person. Esther Williams. Esther Williams gives her usual great swimming performance. But the swimming scenes are very few and far between. Vivian Blaine is not a seasoned screen veteran and her acting is so poor you wonder why the MGM bosses made this picture in the first place. Barry Sullivan is not his usual acting mood. His performance is very bad. In all flop.

This post-WWII film is very dated. The women recruits sing a song about how 'women are nothing without a man'. If you can put this sort of sentiment in the context that it was created, this film has a few things to recommend it. There are a few good musical numbers, and lots of camp humour. It's hilarious that none of the military personnel are ever shown doing anything remotely militant. The Navy is depicted as a social event, with shows, synchronized swimming, dating, hijinks.The DeMarco Sisters contribute a few nice moments to this brief, shallow movie. They harmonize nicely, and perform with enthusiasm.The movie is a mildly entertaining snapshot of the early Fifties, when America was still preoccupied with the war even while it was starting to focus its gaze on the changing relationship between the sexes.

Esther Williams is top-billed and dripping-wet as usual (an underwater ballet with two cloying kiddies is especially hard to take), but the truly frightening presence here is that of Vivian Blaine, fast on the heels of her Broadway triumph in "Guys and Dolls." She had been a likeable but unremarkable singer at 20th in the 40s, then "G&D" gave her a new persona in the character of Adelaide, the adenoidal, Brooklynese nightclub dancer. Here she's Adelaide in all but name, and her rambunctiousness makes Betty Hutton look timid. Her overemphatic line readings and hoydenishness quickly become wearing, but you don't forget her.Esther, who sang acceptably and had a nice comic sense in addition to her aquatic gifts, is a gracious presence and has more to act than usual. Here she's a headstrong rich girl who learns humility--not exactly a fresh idea, but it's spun out gracefully by screenwriter Isobel Lennart, and given some appealing feminist filigrees. The songs are OK, second-lead Joan Evans is dull, and the nearly two-hour running time feels padded out, especially with a couple of specialty numbers thrown in. But it's a decent Technicolor time-passer, with all that postwar Hollywood patriotism that seems to be coming back in vogue.