No wonder the army co-operated with this Elvis movie, it makes the draft seem like a lark - you get to hang out in Germany, do a little bit of soldiering (cool stuff like driving tanks), but you get lots of leave, sing in concerts, put on shows, and romance hot European women. The plot is an old reliable, a soldier has to seduce a woman (or, in 1960 terms, "get into her apartment alone") in order to win a bet - a plot that had done time for Follow the Fleet. Only that one had an extra element, i.e. the "stud" was a wimp, creating comic mayhem - here the stud is Elvis, so you know its not going to be too hard. And indeed, he's pretty much in from the get-go, so there's not a lot of conflict.
Indeed, the scriptwriters could have done a better job - Juliet Prowse (who plays the love interest) likes him straight away, and when she finds out its for a bet (in a very lazy scene), she's only upset for about a minute before finding out it wasn't Elvis' fault and all is resolved very easily.
A if aware of the weak script, the film lunges from song to song - there's about a ten minute. Still its bright and colourful with a number of decent tunes (including "Blue Suede Shoes"), the leggy Prowse does two sexy dances, and Elvis is in good form, engaging and lively and he seems to care. Elvis has around four mates in this one - is there anything more anonymous than actors who played Elvis' friends in his frothy comedies? Except maybe Elvis scriptwriters? (OK, I know Edward Anhalt, Charles Lederer and Clifford Odets worked on his films - I'm talking as an average, though).
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