OPERATION PETTICOAT [1959 / 2019] [Blu-ray + DVD] [UK Release] It’s The Uproarious Tale of the Sub “Sea Tiger” that Blushed so hard, They Dubbed it “The Pink Virgin”
Cary Grant [‘North by Northwest’] and Tony Curtis [‘Some Like It Hot’], two of cinema’s most celebrated stars, provide the comedic pivot point in director Blake Edwards’ [‘The Pink Panther’] Oscar® nominated ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT.’ It’s hijinks on the high seas when revered Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman [Cary Grant] and the somewhat unethical Lt. JG Nicholas Holden [Tony Curtis] team to upright the USS Sea Tiger, a flagging submarine that’s seen better days. With some dubious manoeuvring (and scavenged parts), things begin to look up for the old war horse until the ship and its crew are forced out to sea by a surprise attack. Limping along and barely held together with its borrowed parts, the Sea Tiger gets some unexpected company when five stranded Army nurses are brought aboard. The game gals will prove that necessity is indeed the mother of invention, initiating a series of renovations to make life aboard the Sea Tiger liveable — with the exception of the sub’s accidental pink paint job. Not only is the ship now an eyesore, but a target for both the Japanese and American forces!
Also starring Joan O’Brien [‘The Alamo’], Dina Merrill [‘The Sundowners’], Gene Evans [‘Hell and High Water’] and Dick Sargent [TV’s ‘Bewitched’], Eureka Classics presents one of Blake Edwards most beloved comedies on Blu-ray for the first time in the UK.
FILM FACTS No.1: Awards and Nominations: 1960 Academy Awards®: Nominated: Best Writing, Story and Screenplay and Written Directly for the Screen for Joseph Stone (story), Paul King (story), Maurice Richlin (screenplay) and Stanley Shapiro (screenplay). 1960 Golden Globes: Nominated: Best Motion Picture in a Comedy. Nominated: Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical for Cary Grant. 1960 Laurel Awards: Win: Golden Laurel Award for Top Male Comedy Performance for Cary Grant. Nominated: Golden Laurel Award for Top Comedy. 1960 Writers Guild of America: Nominated: WGA Award (Screen) for Best Written American Comedy for Maurice Richlin and Stanley Shapiro.
FILM FACTS No.2: Tony Curtis took credit for the inception of ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT.’ Tony Curtis had joined the U.S. Navy during World War II with the intent of entering the submarine service in part because his hero, Cary Grant, had appeared in ‘Destination Tokyo’ (1943). After he became a star, Tony Curtis suggested making a film in which Cary Grant would stare into a periscope as he did in ‘Destination Tokyo.’ Tony Curtis very much enjoyed working with Cary Grant. Former Universal-International contract star Jeff Chandler was originally set to have played Matt Sherman, but pulled out to film ‘The Jayhawkers’ (1959) instead. Tina Louise turned down the role of one of the nurses as she felt the film had too many sex jokes. ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ was produced with extensive support of the Department of Defense and the US Navy. Most of the filming was done in and around Naval Station Key West, now the Truman Annex of Naval Air Station Key West, Florida, which substituted for the Philippines and Australia. Filming for the period suggesting post-war 1959 was done at Naval Station San Diego, California. USS Sea Tiger was portrayed by three different American World War II Balao-class submarines, which were USS Queenfish, USS Archerfish and USS Balao. The attacking destroyer and, during the arrival at Darwin, the destroyer visible in the background are the USS Wren (DD-568).
Cast: Cary Grant, Tony Curtis, Joan O'Brien, Dina Merrill, Gene Evans, Dick Sargent, Virginia Gregg, Robert F. Simon, Robert Gist, Gavin MacLeod, George Dunn, Dick Crockett, Madlyn Rhue, Marion Ross, Clarence E. Lung, Frankie Darro, Tony Pastor Jr., Bob Hoy, Nicky Blair, John W. Morley, Arthur O'Connell, Hal Baylor (uncredited), William Bryant (uncredited), Bert Byers (uncredited), Dick Callinan (uncredited), Gordon Casell (uncredited), Malcolm Cassell (uncredited), H. Haile Chace (uncredited), Tony Corrado (uncredited), Dale Cummings (uncredited), Francis De Sales (uncredited), Vince Deadrick Sr. (uncredited), Alan Dexter (uncredited), Kirk Douglas (uncredited), Tusi Faiivae (uncredited), Paul Frees (uncredited), Bob Gibson (uncredited), Larry Gilliland (uncredited), Preston Hanson (uncredited), Fred Harflinger II (uncredited), Harry Harvey Jr. (uncredited), Vi Ingraham (uncredited), Glenn Jacobson (uncredited), Robert Keys (uncredited), Joseph Kim (uncredited), William Kinney (uncredited), James Lanphier (uncredited), Nelson Leigh (uncredited), Leon Lontoc (uncredited), John James Russell (uncredited), Alan Scott (uncredited), Bob Stratton (uncredited), Nino Tempo (uncredited), Howard Venezia (uncredited), Francis L. Ward (uncredited) and Robert C. Youmans (uncredited)
Director: Blake Edwards
Producer: Robert Arthur
Screenplay: Maurice Richlin (screenplay), Stanley Shapiro (screenplay), Joseph Stone (suggested story) and Paul King (suggested story)
Composers: David Rose and Henry Mancini (uncredited)
Cinematography: Russell Harlan, A.S.C. (Director of Photography)
Image Resolution: 1080p (Eastman Color)
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Audio: English: 2.0 LPCM Stereo Audio
Subtitles: English SDH
Running Time: 120 minutes
Region: Region B/2
Number of discs: 2
Studio: Universal International / Paramount Pictures / EUREKA! Entertainment
Andrew’s Blu-ray Review: With the film ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ [1959] the USS Sea Tiger is a submarine on its last legs in 1941, needing extensive repairs and new equipment. Captained by Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman [Cary Grant], the man has all he can deal with in Lt. JG Nicholas Holden [Tony Curtis] and joined the Navy to land a rich wife and live an easy lifestyle and gets assigned to the USS Sea Tiger despite no submarine training or any combat experience. Lt. JG Nicholas Holden is more comfortable with a set of golf clubs and expensive clothes than the inside of a submarine and his commitment to the Navy might be questionable but no one questions that Lt. JG Nicholas Holden is a slick operator looking out for himself only. The Department of Defense and the Navy supported the production, which was shot around Florida’s Naval Station Key West, standing in for the Philippines, and California’s Naval Station San Diego.
And what a picture! ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ starts off surprisingly placid for as wild as it gets. Cary Grant, as Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman, solemnly boards the USS Sea Tiger, which is hours away from the scrapyard. When he gets below deck, he settles into quarters, and begins reading from his logbook, which begins just a few days into World War II, when he captained the USS Sea Tiger submarine and his story is certainly an unusual one – a nearly-destroyed vessel, put back together with dedication and from stolen parts, takes to the sea, wherein they will rescue a group of shipwrecked nurses, steal a pig, get painted pink, and eventually saved thanks to some carefully-deployed undergarments.
Most of the crew are transferred but one new recruit is reassigned to help out. Here we are introduced to Lt. JG Nicholas Holden [Tony Curtis] and the question we get to ask as well as Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman [Cary Grant] does he possess the required skills to be of any assistance, apparently not. Lt. JG Nicholas Holden has never set foot on a submarine and knows nothing about torpedoes, navigation or navel communications. Lt. JG Nicholas Holden expertise lies more in designing recruitment posters and coordinating Navy Day parades in Milwaukee. But Lt. JG Nicholas Holden claims to be an “ideas” man. Which translates that he is a good “scavenger.” Which, in turn, translates as that he can steal items vital to the chances of the USS Sea Tiger making it to Darwin.
Lt. JG Nicholas Holden proves to be totally unorthodox presence above and below water and hires a local witch doctor “to ward off evil spirits and wish us a safe journey.” After the ceremony, as the USS Sea Tiger submarine splutters temperamentally into action, and the witch doctor concludes that, despite his best efforts, and Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman feels that they are never going to make it. Probably the most famous scene from this film is when the sub has to be painted entirely in pink, a humiliation for the crew when it docks and a sitting target for the Japanese air force and even their own United States warships, who when seeing it decide to attack it, thinking it is a Japanese decoy.
‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ humour is definitely rooted in the 1950s time, which today audiences might find awkward and uncomfortable. The banter between the sub’s crew and the female nurses is from a different time period, when expectations for a woman’s role were very much different. Lt. JG Nicholas Holden is an unrepentant womanizer but his character is portrayed as smarmy to begin with, a man you cannot be trusted on anything. There are some very dated stereotypes you don’t find much more in modern entertainment films, though they are innocuous and largely harmless in the film and is an enjoyable Hollywood comedy of its period with a solid premise, a piece of nostalgia featuring one of Hollywood’s biggest-ever stars in Cary Grant, who is suaveness personified, Tony Curtis on the other hand is cheeky fun, the rest of the cast backs them up well and the whole is a froth of mindless fun. If you’re willing to sit back and allow yourself to be entertained, there’s a lot here that you will enjoy and you would be amiss if you did not purchase this Blu-ray disc.
‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ film is definitely full of charm and one rooted deeply in its era. There is a lot of humour based on the time period, but plenty that actually holds up today, including some sexual innuendo, that could not of been edited out, as it would of spoilt the film and ones that were acceptable at the time when the film was released. I’m not sure this film would play very well today with a younger generation audience who I know will be totally uninterested in cinema’s past, as it runs just over two hours and has a very slow pacing to it and again unfortunately misogynous sexual innuendo jokes that they could get away when the film was released and an era that younger audience might not have a clue about, but more so with the older generation. In 1959, this film was actually a pretty massive box office hit. It was the third highest grossing film at the box office for the year and funny how times have changed, because it achieved that with 6.8 million dollars.
Watching Cary Grant and Tony Curtis share scenes was one of the biggest treats of the film for me. Some of the comedy might not work for a modern younger generation and some might not understand when they say, “Wonder why they call it The Head?” and on top of all that, if you are a fan of vintage Hollywood comedy film, World War II related films then you should definitely give ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ a look. Director Blake Edwards ensures no gag is missed, and the whole film is a deliciously tasteless joy, so just sit back, relax and enjoy the film, you will not be disappointed.
OPERATION PETTICOAT MUSIC TRACK LIST
YOU CAN’T WIN (uncredited) [Sung by George Dunn aka “The Prophet”]
BY THE OLD MILL STREAM (uncredited) (Written by Tell Taylor) [Performed by Arthur O'Connell and the Crew and Sung at the New Year's Eve party]
AULD LANG SYNE (uncredited) (Traditional tune and lyrics by Robert Burns) [Performed by Gene Evans and the Crew and Sung at the New Year's Eve party]
I’LL REMEMBER APRIL MUSIC (Lyrics by Patricia Johntson and Don Raye Played by Tokyo Rose radio broadcast) [Performed by Gene DePaul]
Blu-ray Image Quality – Eureka Entertainment presents ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ is has not had much restoration work being done it, but there is also zero sign of any digital tampering or “enhancement.” It’s a nice image that pretty well accurately displays the film stock Eastman Color and for the most part it is a clean image. Some of the blue screen and model work in the film has become a bit more noticeable with the upgrade, but there’s a certain charm and history lesson to that if you’re the right viewer. There are a couple instances inside the submarine with good examples of depth, but for the most part it’s never going to give you the wow factor, but the image certain looks decent. Blacks are a bit faded, and more on the greyer side of things. Colours appear very warm looking due to them using the Eastman Color stock; however the red and white paint being poured into a bucket had some life to it as well as the pink submarine in the film. Despite the age of the film and restoration work done on it, it is still a pleasure viewing this film and as you get into the film you get to enjoy the film very much. Please Note: Playback Region B/2: This will not play on most Blu-ray players sold in North America, Central America, South America, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia. Learn more about Blu-ray region specifications.
Blu-ray Audio Quality – Eureka Entertainment brings you ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ and the film boasts an impressive lossless audio track. The source was apparently in very good shape. The crisp 2.0 LPCM Stereo Audio is well highlighted by its clear dialogue and effective film music score and sound effects. The dialogue reproduction is clean and clear. Since this is a film dominated by dialogue, this is the most important aspect and it is in terrific condition and helps you enjoy the film even more. This may not be audio reference quality, but it is basically what it is, a stereo track with no fluctuations in volume and with dialogue always audible as intended for the audience.
Blu-ray Special Features and Extras:
Theatrical Trailer [1959] 1080p] [1.85:1] [2:23] This is the original Theatrical Trailer for the film ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT.’
Finally, ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ is another classic comedy brought out with the brilliant Eureka Entertainment, and brings a solid release of Blake Edwards’ ‘OPERATION PETTICOAT’ on this Blu-ray release. It’s got a really good presentation for being a 1950s film that hasn’t been put through a masterful restoration process. Its lack of extras is slightly sad, but people should know that’s par for the course on most Eureka Entertainment releases. The important fact is that a classic film starring Cary Grant and Tony Curtis, directed by Blake Edwards has made the jump and preservation to the Blu-ray format. As with any classic comedy, it presents the lighter side of life where heavy consequences just don’t exist. The genius is that it succeeds in doing so with such heavy subject matter and making it a truly brilliant funny uproarious film. Highly Recommended!
Andrew C. Miller – Your Ultimate No.1 Film Aficionado
Le Cinema Paradiso
United Kingdom
