The opening scenes of this film scream "cut about in post production" - lots of narration, Ernie Kovacs badly dubbed, no dialogue scenes. It's awkward and uncertain. Comedy is hard. This film proves it.
The plot has Robert Wagner give a ship to Ernie Kovacs who plans on using it in a bank robbery. Wagner is professional as always but feels miscast - too old, too smooth to play a nebbish idiot. The producers were clearly hoping for Jack Lemmon but in hindsight would have been better off casting Frankie Avalon, who plays a sailor on the ship. Avalon's youth and gee whiz naivety would have worked a tonic. It doesn't help that Wagner is set up as a lech who wants to bang girlfriend Dolores Hart, who won't let him (Hart famously became a nun in real life) - this would have felt a little more forgivable from a super young man like Avalon.
The cast is strong but either misfires or doesn't do enough. Hart tries but doesn't have It. Reviewing her career I think her performance in Where the Boys Are was the exception in its effectiveness rather than the rule. Frank Gorshin and Jess Matthews are fun as crooks but don't do enough; ditto Buddy Hackett was another crook. I kept wanting Kovacs to do more. Carolyn Jones is in glamour mode as Kovacs' moll - weird to see her running around in a bikini.
People try but its badly directed. There's lots of studio bound scenes of the boat, even in a storm. It feels low budget - it's in black and white.
I did laugh at the bank robbery by the crooks dressed up as pilgrims.
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