Mr Winkle Goes to War *** (1944, Edward G Robinson, Ruth Warrick) – Classic Movie Review 13,030

Edward G Robinson stars in the sincere and honest 1944 World War Two comedy-drama film Mr Winkle Goes to War as a meek and mild American bank clerk who turns war hero in the Far East. 

‘Edward G. Robinson brings his greatest characterization to glowing life on the SCREEN!’

Edward G Robinson stars as the eponymous gentleman Mr Wilbert George Winkle in director Alfred E Green’s sincere and honest 1944 World War Two comedy-drama patriotic flag-waver film Mr Winkle Goes to War about an ordinary, meek and mild American bank clerk who turns war hero in the Far East.

Though ageing (he is in his mid-40s) and physically creaky, he is drafted into the army, passes the physical, makes it through basic training, and stays in the forces even when the top age is dropped to under 40 and a new regulation allows men over 38 to get an honourable discharge.

Winkle and his unit are shipped out to the Pacific to fight the Japanese Army, who attack his unit. Winkle uses a bulldozer he’s been sent to repair to knock out a machine-gun nest.

This is a real Edward G vehicle, and he turns in a surprisingly engaging performance, cast against type as the unlikely conscript. Ruth Warrick is good as his shrew of a wife, while Bob Haymes (as Jack Pettigrew, another, younger bank employee also drafted), Richard Lane (as Sergeant ‘Alphabet’ Czeidrowski), and Robert Armstrong (as older recruit Joe Tinker) score as his war buddies. Robert Mitchum has a walk-on as a corporal.

The screenplay by Waldo Salt, George Corey and Louis Solomon is based on the 1943 novel by Theodore Pratt.

It was retitled Arms and the Woman in the UK.

In real life, Robinson was rejected for World War Two service because of his age of 48.

The cast are Edward G Robinson as Wilbert G Winkle, Ruth Warrick as Amy Winkle, Ted Donaldson as Barry, Robert Armstrong as Joe Tinker, Richard Lane as Sergeant ‘Alphabet’ Czeidrowski, Bob Haymes as Jack Pettigrew, Richard Gaines as Winkle’s brother-in-law Ralph Westcott, Art Smith as Mr McDavid, Walter Baldwin, Ann Shoemaker, Paul Stanton, Buddy Yarus, William Forrest, Jeff Donnell, Robert Mitchum, Dennie Moore, Emmett Vogan, Tommy Cook, Ben Taggart, Sam Flint, Forbes Murray, James Flavin, Fred Kohler Jr, Herbert Heyes, and Hugh Beaumont .

Release date: July 19, 1944.

Mr Winkle Goes to War [Arms and the Woman] is directed by Alfred E Green, runs 80 minutes, is made and released by Columbia Pictures, is written by Waldo Salt, George Corey and Louis Solomon, based on the novel by Theodore Pratt, is shot in black and white by Joseph Walker, produced by Jack Moss, and scored by Carmen Dragon, Paul Sawtell and Morris W Stoloff.

© Derek Winnert 2024 – Classic Movie Review 13,030

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