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Abbott & Costello in the Foreign Legion

DVD Release

  • Release Date: 1998

  • Rating: StarStar
  • Genre: Comedy
  • Movie Type: Odd Couple Film, Military Comedy
  • Themes: Foreign Legion, Unlikely Heroes
  • Director: Charles Lamont
  • Main Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Patricia Medina, Walter Slezak, Douglas Dumbrille
  • Release Year: 1950
  • Country: US
  • Run Time: 79 minutes

Plot

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello play wrestling promoters whose star attraction, Wee Willie Davis, skips town to return to his home in Arabia. While scouring the desert in search of Davis, Bud and Lou inadvertently purchase slave girl Patricia Medina, and with equal inadvertence join the Foreign Legion. In their own bumbling, inept fashion, our heroes manage to foil a desert uprising fomented by shiek Douglas Dumbrille and traitorous Legion commandant Walter Slezak. The film's highlights include an opening-scene parody of pre-rehearsed wrestling matches, a "mirage" routine capped by one of the hoariest vaudeville punchlines in history, and a runaway-jeep climax. All in all, however, Abbott & Costello in the Foreign Legion is one of the team's lesser efforts. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Cast


Leon Belasco - Hassam; Marc Lawrence - Frankie; Wee Willie Davis - Abdullah; Tor Johnson - Abou Ben; Jack Raymond - Ali Ami; Fred Nurney - Commandant; Paul Fierro - Ibn; Henry Corden - Ibrim; David Gorcey - Newsboy; Chuck Hamilton - Thugs; Ted Hecht - Proprietor; Alberto Morin - Lieutenant; Buddy Roosevelt - Orderly; Dan Seymour - Josef; Guy Beach - Saleem; Charmienne Harker - Arab Girl; Ernesto Morelli; Jack Shutta; Bobby Barker - Man; Sammy Menacker - Bertram

Credit

Robert Arthur - Producer; Edward A. Curtiss - Editor; Joseph E. Gershenson - Composer (Music Score); John Grant - Screenwriter; Charles Lamont - Director; Martin Ragaway - Screenwriter; George Robinson - Cinematographer; Leonard B. Stern - Screenwriter; D.D. Beauchamp - Short Story Author

Similar Movies

Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy; Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde; Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein; Abbott and Costello Meet the Creature...; Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man; Abbott & Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff; Abbott and Costello in Hollywood; Buck Privates; Buck Privates Come Home; Doughboys; Follow That Camel; Hold That Ghost; In Society; Lost in Alaska; Adventures of a Rookie; Two Arabian Knights; You're in the Army Now; Abbott and Costello Go to Mars; Abbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops; Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd; The Abbott & Costello Show [TV Series]; Abbott and Costello Meet Jerry Seinfeld; The Flying Deuces
 
 
Wikipedia: Abbott and Costello in the Foreign Legion
Abbott and Costello in the Foreign Legion
A&cforeign.jpg
Theatrical Poster
Directed by Charles Lamont
Produced by Robert Arthur
Written by John Grant
Martin Ragaway
Leonard Stern
Starring Bud Abbott
Lou Costello
Patricia Medina
Water Slezak
Music by Joseph Gershenson
Editing by Frank Gross
Distributed by Universal Pictures
Release date(s) July 24, 1950
Running time 80 min.
Language English
Budget $736,000
Preceded by Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff (1949)
Followed by Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951)
IMDb profile

Abbott and Costello in the Foreign Legion is a 1950 film starring the comedy team of Abbott and Costello.

Plot

Bud Jones (Bud Abbott) and Lou Hotchkiss (Lou Costello) are wrestling promoters. Their star, Abdullah (Wee Willie Davis), no longer wishes to follow the script for their crooked matches, especially since he is supposed to lose his next match. Abdullah leaves America to return to his homeland, Algeria. The promoters' financiers, a syndicate that has lent them $5,000 to bring Abdullah to the States, are now requiring them to return the money or face the consequences. The two men follow Abdullah to Algeria in hopes of bringing him back.

Meanwhile, Abdullah's cousin, Sheik Hamud El Khalid (Douglass Dumbrille) and a crooked Foreign Legionnaire, Sergeant Axmann (Water Slezak), have been raiding a railroad construction site in order to extort "protection" money from the railroad company. When Bud and Lou arrive, they are mistaken for company spies, and the Sheik and Axmann attempt to murder them. As each attempt fails, the assassins' hatred for Bud and Lou intensifies, especially when Lou outbids the Sheik for six slave girls, one of whom, Nicole (Patricia Medina), is actually a French spy assigned to gain entry into the Sheik's camp. The boys are then chased, only to wind up hiding at the Foreign Legion headquarters, where Axmann convinces them to join.

Meanwhile, the Foreign Legion Commandant (Fred Nurney) suspects that there is a traitor among the Legionnaires, as the Sheik anticipates every one of the Legion's moves. The Commandant then grants Bud and Lou a pass into town where they meet up with Nicole. She informs them that they must search Axmann's room, but he catches them in the act. However, they are spared, only to end up at a Legionnaire desert camp. Just before the camp is ambushed by the Sheik's men, Bud and Lou wander off in search of a camel, and escape death. They are eventually captured, along with Nicole, and the Shiek orders that one of his wrestlers execute them. The wrestler turns out to be Abdullah, who helps them escape. They head to Fort Apar, where they lure the Sheik's men, and blow it up. They are given awards by the Commandant and discharged from the Legion.

Production

Originally scheduled to begin in December 1949, filming was postponed when Costello had to undergo an operation for a gangrenous gall bladder in November 1949. Filming eventually began on April 28 1950, and ended on May 29, 1950. Despite having a stunt double, Costello did his own wrestling in the film, only to be rewarded with a wrenched arm socket and a stretched tendon.[1].

In 1948, Abbott and Costello fired their agent, Eddie Sherman. Just before the filming of this picture, they reconciled with Sherman and rehired him.[2].

David Gorcey, a member of the comedy team The Bowery Boys, has a cameo appearance in the film. The voice of the skeleton in the film was provided by Candy Candido, who briefly became Abbott's partner in the 1960s after Costello had died.

DVD releases

References

    External links


     
     

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