Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1953-07-17
By harry Macarthur

To describe any movie as the
most preposterous one Hollywood
has happily dispatched your
way since the spring of 1887.
would be foolhardy. A man al
most feels safe, however, in APP
plying the label to South Sea
Woman" which is sprawling
oahshly across the giant piano.
ramic screen at the Warner and
Ambassador.
South Sea Woman" is dedi-
Gated about equally to the pre-
misses that Virginia Mayo is an
appetizing sight and that United
States Marines can Outright any
one. Both are sound premises.
The Marines themselves, how
ever, on a number OF occasions
have much more effectively DEM
onstrated the latter one with
out turning it into burlesque,
which is what the movie does.
The action of South Sea
Woman" takes place in a Sc
ries of dashbacks from the court
martial of a Marine Sergeant
(Burt Lancaster). up for deser-
ton. It seems that shortly be-
fore Pearl Harbor I.ancaster's
Marine buddy, played by Chuck
Connors, eluded his sergeant
who was taking him back to
the evacuation ship. Marine
Connors wanted to marry this
camera girl Miss Mayo in the
SHANGHAI water front dive
Lancaster returned to get Con-
nors and found a battle going
. on. The three. Lancaster, Con-
nors and Miss Mayo, escaped in
the proprietor's launch. neglect
ing to unite it and pulling the
waterfront dive into the river.
On the boat there was another
fight and Miss Mayo knocked the
launch'S wheel off with chair.
They drifted out into the China
Sea and were picked up by a
Chinese junk. They got into a
fight on the junk, shot of lot
of fireworks and set the vessel
afre. The captain made them
swim ashore to a small French
island. where the head man
turned out to be Vichy French.
Connors kept trying to marry
Miss Mayo all through these adj
ventures, but never quite made
it. So. after some more She
naniganS on this island, the trio
wound up on a German yacht
which they captured. setting out
for the war with a crew Of Free
French Lancaster had rescued
from a dungeon.
They had laden this vessel
with a field piece, some trench
mortars, machine guns, hand
grenades and other explosives,
which turned out to have been
thoughtful. In no time at all they
found themselves in the middle
of a Japanese landing force
bound for Guadalcanal, so they
naturally attacked its destroyer
escort. Put the destroyer tenn
porarily out of commission, then
shot up the landing force.
They finally put the de-
stroyer out of the war after
probably the loudeSt and easily
the most preposterous battle &C
ton in movie history. Miss
Mayo was standing behind a
bulkhead out of the way 1t
ended up with the yacht out Of
commission. too, but one landing
assault never struck the Marines
on Guadalcanal.
And that's how Marine Ser
geant Lancaster happened to be
on that raft with that girl. fly
ing a feminine undergarment as
a distress flag.
Most Of the comedy in South
Sea Woman" is aimed at doltS
and the action is for those who
will believe anything. You prob
ably can guess what the court
martial verdict was in Lancast-
er's case after he spun this yarn.
Like Justice Frankfurter in the
case of the transit radios, and
for much the same reason. we'll
have to refrain from voting in
the cases of Sam Bischoff pro
ducer), Arthur Lubin (director) =,
Edwin Blum (screenplay) and
Earl Baldwin and Stanley Sha-
piro adaptation. Really. fell
lows!