'Virgin Soldiers' Rises Above Usual War Film

By EMERSON BATDORFF

It is pleasant to be able to report that there is an intriguing war movie in town. Actually it's an antiwar movie; no movie in its right mind would be prowar, and this movie seems to be in its right mind.

It is "The Virgin Soldiers," and it is about the quiet desperation that attacks people when they get

committed first to the Army in peacetime for a couple of dull years and then, surprisingly, to a sort of combat when they had only expected to be clerks..

The great thing about "The Virgin Soldiers" is that it keeps both feet on the ground. British soil though

"The Virgin Soldiers"

Heights and Westwood

An Army story with universality rare in such tales. Everybody does a good job, managing to lift a fairly ordinary state of affairs to a high level of entertainment. Adults. 96 minutes.

proaches the pitfall of usualness. I thought we had had it when a braggart sergeant was revealed to be somewhat shy of guts in a crisis. But this brush with warmovie destiny was neatly handled without too much harm done to credibility.

Hywel Bennett is resplendent as a desperately dier who turns out to be a earnest young man, a solclerk in Malaya and glad of it too, until they gave clerks rifles to stave off native unrest.

IT HAS been his aim all

along to lose his virginity

and the war interfered.

Lynn Redgrave, a vast woman with a talent just as

Directed by John Dexter. Script by vast, portrays a girl who

John Hopkins on a novel by Leslie Thomas. Produced by Leslie Gilliat and Ned Sherrin. Columbia. Phillipa Raskin

Brigg

Sgt. Driscoll

Sgt. Maj. Raskin

Mrs. Raskin

Sot. Wellbeloved

Gwynn

Juicy Lucy

......Lynn Redgrave ..Hywel Bennett .Nigel Davenport Nigil Patrick ...............Rachel Kempson ..............Jack Shepherd

Lt. Col. Bromley-Pickering Michael

.Tsai Chin

it be, everything is understandable to Americans even in the specialized context for it is mostly about people, and people are people the world over, at least usually they are.

THE MOVIE doesn't go ramming off in all directions in quest of laughs. It finds its laughs within the framework that makes it sensible.

When you add to this humor a couple of forays into war, including a jungle ambush that is confusing only in the sense that such an ambush would confuse the victims and not only the audience, you get an enjoyable evening.

The actors would be very nearly perfect for the usual war movie, but they go just a small smile further. The good sergeant is just a bit too brave and smart. The commanding officer is a trifle too confused ("After all, our men didn't go into service to go on active duty, now, did they?")

The movie at times ap-

takes out her heartache in meanness against her father and other men. The word goes around, so her father says, that she is a lesbian, a canard that she plans to disprove in the most dramatic way.

But this sort of stuff merely provides the fun of "The Virgin Soldiers." Its deeper interest lies in air of authenticity that surrounds the nutty things that happen and the fact that you can like nearly everybody in it. I even forgave it for its cCcasional stereotypes.