A Private's Affair (1959) User Reviews

If you don't like it, don't mention it!

[JohnHowardReid · 4/10 · 23 June 2017]

Copyright 1959 by 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation. New York opening at the Paramount: 14 August 1959. U.S. release: August 1959. U.K. release: October 1959. Australian release: 10 December 1959. Sydney opening at the Regent. 8,305 feet. 92 minutes.

SYNOPSIS: Jerry Morgan (Barry Coe), a personable young man just out of college, Luigi Maresi (Sal Mineo), a jive talking musician, and Mike Conroy (Gary Crosby), playboy heir to an Oregon cattle empire, are all drafted and end up in the same platoon for basic training in a New Jersey Army camp.

COMMENT: I have the Edinburgh Film Festival's 156-page book on Raoul Walsh in front of me. Would you believe that apart from the filmography there's not a single mention of "A Private's Affair"? Typical auteurist procedure. If you come across a film from one of your idols that simply doesn't fit into your sublime theories, just drop it. Just pretend it doesn't exist.

Admittedly, I don't blame auteurists for not mentioning it. "A Private's Affair" is a pretty awful film, whatever your outlook. It's one of those movies made to woo the youth market, but even the most callow or undemanding crop would see the movie as ridiculously dated, impossibly heavy-handed and positively meager in any entertainment qualities.

Even the title, "A Private's Affair", sounds dreadfully dull. And believe me, it's every foot-slogging bit as dull as it sounds. Now a general's affair holds out a bit of promise (v. "Top Secret Affair"). Even a colonel's (v. "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp"). But a private's! (A sergeant is the lowest rank that will interest any worthwhile girls. See "Force of Arms" and "From Here to Eternity").

Considering the triteness and lameness of the script, the young players act it out with incredible earnestness and even enthusiasm. Unfortunately this risible dichotomy between the shallowness of their material and their elephantine efforts to give it weight produces no laughs.

Director Raoul Walsh no doubt saw "A Private's Affair" as a paid holiday. He has done nothing at all to inspire audience sympathy or participation. In fact he hasn't even bothered to dress up the film. Not only is every scene handled like a cheap television show in monotonous patterns of establishing shots and close-ups, but sets and costumes are unbelievably dowdy. As for the color photography credited to Charles G. Clarke, it manages the seemingly impossible, being both fearfully grainy yet sharply unflattering. He seems to have gone out of his way to emphasize the worst features of his young players. Miss Moore in particular should sue!

Ten seconds of the Volantes

[F Gwynplaine MacIntyre · 2/10 · 8 February 2003]

"A Private's Affair" is a 'musical' in only the most charitable sense of the term. If one song performed over and over throughout a feature-length movie is enough to make that movie a 'musical', then "A Private's Affair" qualifies. During the opening credits, we hear a song called "It's the Same Old Army". It's a pleasant song, with a brisk tune and a decent lyric. You'll be hearing it again, later. And later. And later still.

Luigi (Sal Mineo) is an Army private with a chip on his shoulder and some personal problems. He's also a talented jazz drummer (Mineo does his own drumming in this movie), but the Army offers few outlets for this ability. His best buddy is Mike Conroy (Gary Crosby, playing his role in the easy-going manner that made his father Bing a star).

One morning, Luigi and Mike and two other grunts are assigned to unload heavy sacks of potatoes. While doing this, they improvise a song called "It's the Same Old Army", and they heave the sacks back and forth while singing this song. It's a pleasant song, but we've already heard them sing it during the opening credits, so the song is already a reprise the first time they perform it. Still, the number is well-staged, with the PFCs lugging heavy sacks up and down in time to the music while they sing. The lyric is interesting: it describes army life irreverently without actually being disrespectful. Of course, it's implausible that four guys are all able to improvise the same song, with tune and lyric falling perfectly into place, but...

Word gets out to the base commander, who decides that the four squaddies should warble their ditty on a nationwide TV show. (Ah, the Army!) Quick as you can say 'ten-hut!', our lads are packed off to New York City to perform on a live broadcast. But, um, well, y'see, Private Luigi has a lot of personal problems, and he's going to throw away his big break (and the big break for his three buddies) because he needs to go somewhere and sulk, and darkly brood. Or maybe he won't throw away his big break after all. Which will it be?

Who cares? The song 'It's the Same Old Army' is performed over and over, with less variation and less imagination each time it's reprised. Several good performers in the cast list (Barbara Eden, Jim Backus, Jessie Royce Landis) have nothing to do.

"A Private's Affair" is one of those annoying and unconvincing military-themed movies in which a commanding officer, in charge of thousands of men, spends all his time trying to resolve the personal problems of one disaffected inductee. Other examples of this dismal sub-genre are "Thousands Cheer" and "Buck Privates" (the dull subplot with Lee Bowman, not the brilliant comedy sequences with Abbott & Costello).

I sought out "A Private's Affair" only because the great director Raoul Walsh made it, and I want to see as many Walsh films as I can. I was disappointed. Walsh appears to have phoned in his efforts here, bringing nothing to the pacing and characterisation of this film. Mineo and Gary Crosby were heart-throbs for teenage girls at this time: I suspect that the executives at 20th Century-Fox decided that this movie would be a big hit purely on the strength of Mineo's and Crosby's presence, without requiring a decent script or a good score. (They were probably right.)

I did enjoy one brief scene near the climax of the film, when we see the novelty act which goes on the TV show just before Crosby's quartet. This act consists of two guys who ride unicycles and chuck Indian clubs at each other while wearing silly hats and blowing bubble pipes. **WHILE** they're juggling the Indian clubs and riding the unicycles, each one grabs the other guy's hat and bubble pipe and transfers them to his own head and mouth ... and they keep doing all of these things simultaneously. It's an astonishing act, and unfortunately it only appears on screen for about ten seconds. This novelty act is consists of two guys named Scott Beldin and Don Thompson, who performed together for a while as the Volantes, but who also made at least one appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show while billed as the Martin Brothers. I wish that "A Private's Affair" had featured much more footage of the Volantes, and much less footage of the bathetic plot involving Sal Mineo. I'll rate "A Private's Affair" 2 points out of 10.