Shipmates Forever

A couple of months back, I did a post on the Dick Powell/Ruby Keeler movie Flirtation Walk, mentioning that it was going to be airing in a double feature with another Powell/Keeler movie, Shipmates Forever; in fact I had both on my DVR from a previous double feature. Going through the long backlog of movies on my DVR, I've finally gotten around to watching Shipmates Forever, so now would be a good time to do a post on it.

This time around, Dick Powell doesn't start off in the US military. Instead, it's his father, a man named Richard Melville II and played by Lewis Stone, who is in the military. Specifically, he's an admiral who has reached the age where they can't really use him on a ship any more so that he'd be better for the Navy as the commandant of the Naval Academy in Annapolis. He's about to have his last watch ceremony on board ship, and would really like his son, Richard III (that's Dick Powell, as implied above) to come down and see it.

Dick III, being played by Dick Powell, is a radio crooner who loves his father, but would really rather continue being a radio crooner since his heart isn't anywhere near the navy and besides, his radio work really pays the bills in a way serving in the navy wouldn't. But since he loves his father, he travels to port to see his father's retirement ceremony. Dad uses this as an opportunity to try to manipulate his son into trying out for the Academy. Interestingly, Dad's rather selfish treatment of his son is consistently portrayed in Shipmates Forever as a good thing.

At the ceremony, Dick III meets a lovely young woman, June Blackburn (Ruby Keeler), and immediately falls for her. In talking about joining the Navy, June mentions that she's not so certain she wants a husband in the navy, since she lost her father and a brother in the war (which of course refers to the first World War, since the movie predates the European theater of World War II). But young Dick finally caves to his father's pressure, and takes the entrance exam with the intenion of refusing his commission when he graduates.

We then get introduced to a couple of other men who also want to enroll at the academy. Coxswain (John Arledge) is already in the Navy but wants to become an officer, which necessitates getting into Annapolis. Cowboy (Eddie Acuff) is joining from Arizona, while Sparks (Ross Alexander), who has a way with the radio, is also not from a navy family.

As you can guess, all for get in, and become roommates together, at least during their first year. But young Dick is still insistent on going back to crooning after graduation, refusing the commission, so he makes himself distant from those who would otherwise be his friends. This includes even Coxswain, who really wants Dick's help in not flunking out of the Academy. Once again, Dick's actions are presented as being a bad thing. And then, to make matters worse, June tells Dick that she can't marry him if he drops out of the Academy or refuses his commission!

Of course, as you might guess, Dick is going to get a chance to "redeem" himself at the end, and given what's transpired in the first 90 minutes or so, you can guess how that's going to go. Shipmates Forever is supposed to be a feel-good movie.

For me, however, Shipmates Forever doesn't work as well as Flirtation Walk, for several reasons, and I say that as someone who didn't think Flirtation Walk holds up as well as the Warner's musicals from 1933. One is that, as I strongly implied above, Lewis Stone is just downright nasty here at times as the father trying to cajole his son into following his footsteps, and not what the son wants -- especially considering what the son wants is in no way unrespectable or immoral. Worse, however, is that Powell and especially Keeler are somewhat misused here. Shipmates Forever is somewhat of a musical, and Powell certainly gets to sing. But Keeler, known as a dancer (cue the jokes about the quality of her dancing), gets precious few opportunities to dance. And there aren't any Warner Bros.-style musical numbers here.

Shipmates Forever comes across as the sort of movie where the studio bosses saw the success of Powell and Keeler as a screen couple and wanted to put them in another movie together, but didn't really have anything ready to put them into. The result is a movie where the component parts don't really jell.