Wonderfully funny and subversive military satire

Rating: 10/10 (22 May 2016)

Set during the Korean War, two surgeons, Captains "Hawkeye" Pierce (played by Donald Sutherland) and "Duke" Forrest (Tom Skerritt), join the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH), located three miles from the front lines. Both are draftees and care little for military protocols and conventions. They are soon joined by surgeon even more anarchic and insubordinate in his attitude, Captain "Trapper" John McIntyre (Elliott Gould). The unit's commander is the laid back-yet-efficient Lt Colonel Henry Blake (Roger Bowen). He is assisted by Corporal "Radar" O'Reilly (Gary Burghoff). Hawkeye, Duke and Trapper soon have the camp running to their rather non-military tune but run into Major Frank Burns (Robert Duvall) and the new chief nurse Major Margaret O'Houlihan (Sally Kellerman), both of whom being by-the- book permanent military types. Hawkeye, Duke and Trapper set out to undermine the pair. High jinks ensue.
A wonderfully funny and subversive military satire, directed by Robert Altman. Some hilarious dialogue and scenes (the football scenes are side-splittingly funny), with the whole movie having a delightfully irreverent and anarchic tone. Against the general backdrop of comedy we also have some reasonably graphic operating theatre scenes. This shows the grim reality of what the characters are facing, and why they need humour to remain sane. It's not all satire...
Robert Altman directs with a loose grip (to the point that apparently many of the lines were ad-libbed) and this helps the movie. The sense of disorder is heightened.
Even more famous than this movie is the TV series that it spawned. That lasted 11 years.