Senteur As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Nicole I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Scotty Burke It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

ussdixonjones I've been watching this show every time it gets on TV for another go 'round and now that it's not on TV where I'm at, I'm watching it on youTube! Phil Silver's Sgt. Bilko is one of the absolute genius comic persona of a fictitious character of all time! Actually, I don't know if the director or the writers had anything to do with the way he portrays the character. But I am assuming he did all the phony smiling, and facial expressions with just the material he was given. And boy, did he translate it into an unforgettable character. Sort of like what Ed O'Neill did with Al Bundy, except Sgt. Bilko is more defined, what a genius of a character!!!

mkb-8 I had just watched the fine blu ray re-issue of 'The Day the Earth Stood Still' (the superior 1951 version)and hearing Gort the robot utter those immortal words 'Klaatu barada nikto' I recalled the episode of the Phil Silvers Show where Sergeant Bilko persuades the hapless Doberman to pose as an alien, wandering about the camp muttering the same phrase.Fortunately I had recorded the show when it was last aired in the UK by the BBC, back in 1997, although I hadn't watched it since. However, that space alien Doberman episode proved so hilarious that I watched another the next day, and another each day after that, until I had viewed all ninety shows in my collection. Not once did my interest flag.To say that the program is consistently amusing and inventive is a gross understatement. In my opinion it is the best TV comedy of all time and just as funny now as it was in the mid to late 1950s when it first aired.Much of that is down to the superb cast: comic genius Phil Silvers, that lugubrious master of deadpan Paul Ford (Colonel Hall), the all too easily duped Sergeants Grover and Ritzik (personal favorites of mine) and of course the platoon members, all wonderful comic turns in their own right.The other great plus for the show is that it was recorded on film, so the picture looks as good today as it did at the time of original transmission, when I can remember my late father chuckling at Bilko on our little 17 inch screen TV. (By contrast, the best BBC comedy of the period, Hancock's Half Hour, was performed live and cine-recorded from a 405 line TV screen during transmission, so surviving recordings are of relatively poor quality.) Finally, I must pay tribute to the writers of the show, among them a young Neil Simon. Many of the comic situations they employed are still a staple of TV comedy today and were no doubt also in use on the vaudeville stage in the decades before television became the dominant form of entertainment.

didi-5 Phil Silvers featured in the show now universally known as 'Bilko', after the character he played, a wisecracking, gambling sergeant in the US Army. A long-running situation comedy from the early years of television, it still stands up as exceptionally funny today.Over 143 episodes, Sgt Ernest Bilko plotted, schemed, and stumbled over his lines (this was live television, after all). The pauses and the ad libs add to the genius of this series, viewed five decades later. It also made a star of Silvers, who up to this point had been a comedian, actor, and singer (he was Gene Kelly's pal in 'Cover Girl', for example) - although following Bilko, he never really found a suitable starring role again.In 1996, a misguided attempt to bring Bilko to the big screen, starring Steve Martin, failed, possibly because the character really could only be played by one man. Original episodes still air regularly over the world, and a collection of episodes (sadly only a fraction of the ones available) were released on DVD for the 50th anniversary of the show.

John T. Ryan With World War II ending just 10 years before, THE PHIL SILVERS SHOW, alias YOU'LL NEVER GET RICH, alias SGT. BILKO found a ready family audience in the young "Boomers" and their Depression/WWII parents.Therefore, we had a nation full of Mothers and Fathers roughly aged mid 30's to late 40's who together with their "Boomer" offspring , found that material relating to the "War" (or the Military in general) and the 1930's seemed to be favourite topics of 1950-60's TV Series. Hence we saw the great successes of shows like COMBAT, NAVY LOG, and THE UNTOUCHABLES.It was during these years that the "Service Comedy" became a staple for the sitcom. This format of being on the inside of the Armed Forces, no doubt has its genealogy traceable back to eras far before any electronic media of TV, Radio or the Movies. Indeed, we can no doubt find the embryonic beginnings of the Service Comedy among the works of Mr. W. Shakespeare and company.As for our own research, we believe the direct Ancestor or "Missing Link" between the Service Comedy Feature Film and the Service TV Sitcom "evolved" over at Hal Roach Studios' "Laugh Factory". "Streamliner" was his name for his approximately 55 minute film. This put them in between feature and a 2 or 3 Reeler (short subject). During his period that Roach Studios gave us t of the World the "Streamliner" Series of Eight SGT. DOUBLEDAY Movies (1941-52). The comedies featured the misadventures of Sgt. Dorian "Dodo" Doubleday (Mr. Tracy) and everybody's Screen Sergeant, Joe Sawyer as Sgt. William Ames. The two made a splendid film comedy team; with their whole often hilarious interplay's being the friction between the two. On the one hand, Sgt. Ames (Mr. Sawyer), was the gruff, self made Army career-man and Blue Collar type. College man, Sgt. Doubleday (Tracy), on the other hand, was the "90 Day Wonder" type. His character was representative of those called-up in 1940's first ever Peace Time Draft in U.S. History. It was guys like this who got promoted from PFC to Corporal and Sergeant on the Fast Track. This of course created animosity with the veteran career men as represented by Sgt. Ames (still Joe Sawyer).So, this brings us to the 1950's and the Golden Age of Television. During this time and up to 1958 and the dawn of Videotape, a series was either on film (regular or Kinescoped) or it was live. And pre-dating BILKO by three months (June '55 to September '55) was Bud Yorkin's THE SOLDIERS on NBC. The Series which was most likely slotted as one of those old Summer Replacement series, a status from which it never would matriculate to the higher level of Regular Series University. (Too bad; as it had shown a sort of adult humor promise. No, Schultz, I didn't mean 'Blue Humor.') So it was after this we were inundated with the likes of McHALE'S NAVY, BROADSIDE (a female version of McHale), ENSIGN O'TOOLE, NO TIME FOR SERGEANTS (Broadway, Movie & TV), GOMER PYLE, U.S.M.C. and even F TROOP. Oh, yeah, by the way, we almost forgot THE PHIL SILVERS' SHOW.SERGEANT BILKO hit the CBS TV Network 1n September of 1955 and remained a staple until 1959. Its main feature was in giving the Army's Enlisted Men, Non Coms and Officers foibles, equal to or far surpassing everyone in Civilian Life. In the fictional Kansas locale of Fort Baxter, the Motor Pool Platoon is run by con-man and old War War II Veteran Master Sergeant Ernest Bilko (Phil Silvers). He runs the motor pool in whatever time he can squeeze-in between hatching whatever get rich schemes that his always grifting little head can conceive.The now middle-aged Ernie Bilko also sees himself as quite a Ladies' Man and many of the weekly episodes involve his on base girlfriend, some visiting beauty or even both.Some of our favourite episodes in volved: a.the Platoon's getting a Chimpanzee through an Army physical, Bilko's being audited by Uncle Sugar and the Sgt.'s getting to see himself as others do vs. what he thinks of himself.Aiding and abetting in this was a great, if somewhat elderly players doing the men of Bilko's Motor Pool Platoon as well as others in the Fort Baxter Command. Starting from the top we have the C.O., Colonel Hall (outstanding Paul Ford), Sergeant Grover (Signal Corps, Jimmy Little*) and Mess Sergeant Rupert Ritzy ( hilarious Joe E. Ross), Cpl. Barbella (Harvey Lembeck), Cpl. Henshaw (Allan Melvin), Pvt.'s Duane Doberman** (Maurice Gosfield), Dino Paparelli (Billy Sands), Pvt. Gander, Cpl. Fender (Herbie Faye) and others. As an example of a truly strange anecdote of the BILKO Show; they were assigned a young Officer by the Army Brass as Technical Adviser. The Captain was asked to do an on-camera appearance as an M.P., which he reprised several more times. The Captain's name was George Kennedy! Ya gotta start somewhere, Schultz! NOTE: * Mr. Nat Hiken had great admiration for the Old Time Vaudeville & Burlesque Comedians. He proved so by casting guys like Jimmy Little and Joe E. Ross (both former Burlesque Comics) in not only the SGT.BILKO Series, but also in CAR 54, WHERE ARE YOU? NOTE: ** In a most unusual of merchandising, National Comics Publications (aka Superman/DC) not only published a SGT. BILKO Comic Book; but also spun-off a second title, SGT. BILKO'S PRIVATE DOBERMAN!