Carry on Sergeant

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DanTheMan 2 Despite no intention of becoming a series, Carry On Sergeant would spawn a long-lasting British institution, a modest beginning if there ever was one. Starting as little more than an attempt to cash in on the huge success of the ITV sitcom The Army Game, the film is, in many respects, rather anomalous when compared to some of the later titles I'm more familiar with, particularly its romantic subplots and occasional sentimentality. Even the vaguely risqué story of a pair of newlyweds desperately trying to celebrate their wedding night is dispensed with surprisingly early on, in favour of fairly traditional service comedy high jinks. Nonetheless, it introduces in embryonic form many of the themes and characters that would recur throughout the series, while many of the comic set pieces, such as Kenneth Connor's relentless medical examinations and the various training disasters, are still funny and confidently handled. The jokes are a lot lighter, mild-mannered and harmless, ultimately benefiting from a great guest performance from a pre-Doctor Who William Hartnell as the titular Sergeant. Compitently made and well-acted, Carry On Sergeant is a reasonably gentle affair, lacking the smut and sauce that would later become the series' hallmark. Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 03/02/25 Full Review Audience Member An underwhelming first entry in the U.K.'s second-longest running film series, Carry on Sergeant has dedicated performances and moments of amusing slapstick mostly related to a hypochondriac and a NAAFI girl named Norah but, based off of what I've seen from later Carry On films from small clips when I was on holiday in England, early instalment weirdness hit this movie HARD. It has no real sense of pacing, I hardly laughed outside of the aforementioned scenes and the fairly grounded approach left me feeling bored more often than not. I wanted to like this movie but I was left unimpressed. Crude as it might be, Police Academy did it better. Rated 2/5 Stars •  Rated 2 out of 5 stars 01/23/23 Full Review Audience Member Saw this film over 50 years ago. Still one of the best of British. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 01/21/23 Full Review Audience Member True, it's only intermittently funny but there's something genuinely charming and poignant about this first instalment of the increasingly smutty Carry On series, partly because the 'team' all play secondary characters and they all look so young (well, apart from Charles Hawtrey). Great older character actors like Eric Barker and William Hartnell play with a gravitas that adds to the comedy and it's an enjoyable diversion for a Sunday afternoon. Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 01/27/23 Full Review bill t Surprisingly good and touching, when especially I wasn't expecting much from this. This was a great intro to this mammoth collection of films. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review Audience Member The very first of the "Carry On " series. Just watched it again for the umpteenth time,on DVD. Pure nostalgia,asI enterred the Army in 1952 and the memories kept flooding back ! And a marvellous cast of British acting stalwarts.Including William Hartnell and Bill Owen. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/24/23 Full Review Read all reviews

Carry on Sergeant

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