Best WW2 Comedy

What's the best WW2 comedy that you guys have ever seen? The TV series Hogan's Heroes are my favorite WW2 comedy although most of it is not accurate but yet its still a good series to watch. You guys ever seen the series?

 

Dad's Army and 'Allo 'Allo for me.

Seen Hogan's Heroes many times. Like most good comedies, doesn't age.

 

WWII comedy?

Well the movie Battle of the Bulge comes to mind first, but....

I like:
Mister Roberts (James Cagney, Henry Fonda, Jack Lemmon, William Powell, Ward Bond) with a entourage like that, how can you go wrong?

Honorable Mentions:

The Secret of Santa Vittoria Anthony Quinn plays a 'drunk' Italian mayor trying to hide the town's wine from the Germans.

What Did You Do In The War Daddy? Blake Edwards produced this one. Hard to find.

Operation Petticoat

I Was a Male War Bride Cary Grant

 

dont think i've actually seen any... any recommendations

 

What's the best WW2 comedy that you guys have ever seen? The TV series Hogan's Heroes are my favorite WW2 comedy although most of it is not accurate but yet its still a good series to watch. You guys ever seen the series?

Sorry, I didn't exactly answer your question. I watched Hogan's Heroes when I was a boy and remember when it was a first run show. I liked it then, although I'm not a big fan of it now. I guess I need to suspend reality and look at the show for what it is-comedy.

John Banner is funny to me and reminds me of Sig Ruman's Sgt. Schultz of Stalag 17 fame.

 

Dad's Army
Allo Allo
McHales Navy

Hogans Heroes: Bob Crane (Hogan) was murdered in 1978. A little trivia: John Banner (Sgt Schultz) was supposed o play Klink and vice versa.

From Wikipedia:

Series criticisms


Hogan's Heroes (book cover)


While Hogan's Heroes was (and remains) a popular show, it has been the target of criticism. As with the later British sitcom 'Allo 'Allo!, there were many who were disturbed by the portrayals of the Germans as funny and incompetent. Many felt this trivialized the evil of the Nazis and the war. But Klink was a career soldier, and many real-life members of the Luftwaffe and Wehrmacht, even among the officer corps, were historically not Nazis. Klemperer certainly believed that the show portrayed Nazis as bad enough - otherwise he would have pulled out. Leon Askin's parents died in a Nazi concentration camp, and Robert Clary and John Banner had been in concentration camps as well, and evidently these actors did not believe the series trivialized the Holocaust or the Nazi regime in general.
The show had come under fire by Neo-Nazi groups who felt it was a lampooning of their founding fathers, and occasionally some of the cast and crew members would be subject to threats of violence from such groups. Other groups which were critical of the show were some Jewish, (and to a lesser extent) Gypsy organizations, both of whom had lost significant numbers of their people in the Holocaust, and not yet a generation had passed since the genocide and the premiere of Hogan's Heroes. Most complaints of these groups felt the show was taking the subject too lightly. However, although the show focused on a POW camp, never in one single episode was there ever a mention about the concentration camps or Hitler's final solution. Some groups which were the biggest fans of the show were the Veterans of Foreign Wars and other veterans' groups, many of whom their members were actual POWs, and had thought that the humor had been a good way to put their suffering in perspective. [1]
An opposing viewpoint considers the portrayal of the Nazis as hopeless buffoons to be a good way to divest them of any allure and power, comparing it to similar portrayals in several skits from Monty Python's Flying Circus.
Sgt. James "Kinch" Kinchloe (played by Ivan Dixon) was an African-American who served as an apparent, if not actual, second-in-command to Col. Hogan. At a time in America where civil rights issues were still being resolved, Kinch was a groundbreaking character as Hogan's Heroes was in the AC Nielsen Top 10 for the first two seasons. This contrasted with other popular TV sitcoms of the era, such as The Andy Griffith Show, where black characters rarely appeared in the town of Mayberry. However, this was another element of apparent unreality, as the Nazis' racial theories would have made it highly unlikely that they would have housed a black prisoner with whites; in fact, blacks in the U.S. armed forces of the era were limited to segregated units, generally led by white officers. Although it may have been explained that SSG Kinchoe had been in an all-black unit who was captured and sent to Stalag 13, which had been so isolated the Nazis did not bother with the luxury of segregating their POWs. Also, the Code of Conduct demanded that all prisoners (except Col. Hogan), being of inferior rank to SSG Kinchloe, obey his lawful commands that in the absence of Hogan, he would lawfully be required to be commander of the POWs in Stalag 13.

 

Allo, Allo has to be one of the all-time greats in war comedy. Doc

 

You can really see a theme developing here depending on where you come from.

Can only be Dad's Army or 'Allo 'Allo

 

Leesen very carefully! I shall say zis only wunce!

Its Gruber and his Little Tank.

 

Dads army. Been a long time since I've seen it. The one bit which always sticks in my mind is when they're all stuck on a little raft in a river, trying to decide who's gonna swim for it. After a while someone is picked to go for it, and when he 'jumps' in the water is only up to their knees. haha. Chortle chortle!!

 

I agree with Slipdigit, The Movie Battle of the Bulge has got to be one of the biggest jokes ever put to film, along with Pearl Harbor and U-571!!!!

As regards TV, well 'Allo Allo is my favourite. The policeman attempting to speak French was brilliant!

 

This link to the French Dnepr motorcycle site shows a clip from La Grande Vadrouille with Bourvil. It makes me laugh every time.

http://dnepr.ural.free.fr/la_grande_vadrouille.wmv

I still like Dad's Army. It was gentle and respectful. The buffoons were mocked but not what they did and what they stood for. There was never any suggestion that they wouldn't have fought to the last man if it had been for real.

 

Ah, La Grande Vadrouille! With Terry Thomas, Bourvil, Louis de Funès, etc. Great comedy!

I never saw Dad's Army, but I was fortunate to see Allo, Allo! at the time, and a rerun a couple of years ago, plus the DVD collection is available. Great fun as well, with the Old Bat in her room in the attic whose bed also worked as radio aerial, the two incredibly thick British pilots who never managed to get sent to Britain, the Madonna of the Big Boobies, etc. etc. Unforgievable if you miss it.

 

Dad's Army and 'Allo 'Allo are obviously clear favourites but I also thought that Good Night Sweetheart was also very funny.
Cheers
CTNana
p.s. are / were there similar programmes in the Axis countries?

 

What's where you come from got to do with it, Stevew? I'm a yank, and voted for a Brit show..... I always enjoyed Hogan's Heros, but Allo, Allo has it beat all hollow for humor. In this case, at least, humor is trans-cultural (though I haven't found any fans for Allo, Allo among my German friends-- most have never heard of it....) Doc

 

Am with steve, if you are from America or Oz apparently you seem to really like Hogan's Heroes (which i personally have never heard mentioned before), the Brits go straight for 'Allo 'Allo and Dads Army, then anything else afterwards. Does seem to be a bit of a cultural difference developing.

 

Like, quit it with the negative waves dude!

 

Kellys heroes is a good film. I think Donald Sutherland plays a brilliant role as the odd ball tank commander.