1h 10min | Music, Romance, War | 22 November 1943
Director: Sam Newfield
Stars: Rosemary Lane, Johnny Downs, Charlotte Wynters, Sheldon Leonard.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035972/
Watched online, poor/blurry print (hard to recognize RL).
RL plays an actress freshly released from her studio contract. SL is her (press) agent, who meets a farmer in need of labor. So SL's gal feeds him the idea of having his clients help at the farm for publicity. It turns into a national movement of people helping at farms. "Food is the ammunition that will win this war." Apparently volunteering was a part of the solution to labor shortages, but I don't find any mention of it being widespread in my quick internet search. Here's an article from University of Nebraska, Lincoln about farming on the Great Plains during the war. Also found info on the bracero program on Wikipedia.
SL's clients, including a band, perform during off-hours to entertain themselves and lighten the load. (This being a musical, music also plays while 2 people are bicycling (process shot) and singing out "on the road.") To promote the national movement, they do a radio broadcast from the barn. Soundtracks on IMDb is blank, and I have no way to add any of the many songs, the names of which are unknown to me.
SL is his usual personality, heavy NY accent, shifty but not a gangster here. I like him, especially his 2 versions of Nick the bartender in It's a Wonderful Life ('46). In addition to his 69 film credits, he became a TV mogul, credited as Producer for Make Room for Daddy ('53-'64), The Dick Van Dyke Show ('61-'66), The Andy Griffith Show ('60-'68), I Spy ('65-'68) and Gomer Pyle: USMC ('64-'69) among others.
This is another movie that refers to Hitler as Schicklgruber, birth name of Hitler's father who was born out of wedlock and later changed his name to Hitler, a form of Heidler, his birth/step father's name. It was never Hitler's name.
I'm glad to have watched this for another insight to the homefront during the war, but especially without a decent print, I can't recommend this.
Walter Colmes Productions, distr. PRC, dir. Newfield; 6-
