Film

This Is the Army

A 1943 Irving Berlin wartime revue stretched into a feature, following an all-soldier Broadway show staged to raise war-bond money, echoing a real production from the previous war. Expect brassy numbers, corny father-son romance plotting, and actual servicemen singing and dancing in uniform. It's less drama than morale campaign — unapologetically earnest, occasionally startling in its era's blind spots. Best for classic-musical completists and WWII-history buffs.

TMDb rating2.9

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like backstage musicals built around a parade of big production numbers, where the energy of the stage matters more than the plot holding together.

Skip it if you find wartime patriotism hard to sit through without irony, since the flag-waving is sincere and rarely undercut, and the romance runs on a thin, familiar track.

What it asks of you: Two hours of patience for rehearsals and revue numbers, a slow build toward the big sequences, and a bright tone that holds even as the uniforms come on.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Yankee Doodle Dandy1942

Cagney tap-dances through George M. Cohan's life with the same brassy, flag-waving showbiz energy Berlin's film trades in, and he's genuinely electric doing it — patriotism with real craft underneath.

But It's still hagiography — Cohan's rough edges get sanded off almost as thoroughly as any wartime soldier's.

Yankee Doodle Dandy poster

White Christmas1954

Same songwriter, same warm nostalgia for army buddies turned entertainers, but with Technicolor gloss and a tighter script — Berlin at his most purely enjoyable.

But It's cozier and less urgent than This Is the Army — don't expect the same wartime stakes.

White Christmas poster

Holiday Inn1942

The film that gave the world the song 'White Christmas', with Crosby and Astaire trading barbs and dance numbers — Berlin's showbiz machine at an earlier, looser gear.

But It's a romantic comedy first; wartime spirit barely enters, and one number shares the same blackface blind spot.

Holiday Inn poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from This Is the Army

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Oh! What a Lovely War1969

It borrows the exact structure This Is the Army uses — a revue restaging a war through song — but turns every recruiting number into savage irony, showing morale-boosting entertainment from the other side of the trench.

Richard Attenborough's ensemble musical stages WWI as a seaside pierrot show, using real recruitment songs and dance numbers to build a devastating anti-war satire — same format, opposite conclusion.

But It's bleak where This Is the Army is cheerful — the songs turn savage, and the ending offers no comfort at all.

Oh! What a Lovely War poster
More like this (8)

Stage Door Canteen1943

A real wartime morale film stuffed with actual celebrities playing versions of themselves, serving coffee and jokes to soldiers — the same patriotic cavalcade spirit, straight from 1943.

But The plot is thin scaffolding for cameos; go in for the novelty, not the story.

Stage Door Canteen poster

Hollywood Canteen1944

Another parade of real stars doing their bit for the troops, this time from the studio that made it — warm, silly, genuinely moving wartime propaganda.

But It's shameless star-spotting over storytelling, charming rather than gripping.

Hollywood Canteen poster

For Me and My Gal1942

Garland and Kelly in a WWI-set backstage musical wrestling with the same tension at the heart of Berlin's film — ambition and showbiz versus the pull of duty.

But It's a straighter romance-drama with music, less spectacle and more heartbreak than a full revue.

For Me and My Gal poster

Star Spangled Rhythm1942

Paramount's own all-star wartime revue, packed with musical numbers and gags from its biggest names — a lighter, funnier cousin to Berlin's more solemn patriotism.

But The comedy is dated vaudeville shtick and the plot barely exists.

Star Spangled Rhythm poster

This Above All1942

A more serious wartime drama about duty, desertion and love under pressure — the emotional stakes This Is the Army gestures at but never quite dramatizes.

But No music, no jokes — a straight romantic war drama, tonally miles from the film that led you here.

This Above All poster

The Fighting Sullivans1944

A homefront family drama about five brothers who all serve — no musical numbers, just the quieter, more devastating side of the sacrifice being celebrated on stage in Berlin's film.

But It's a tearjerker with a real, brutal ending — nothing like the show-must-go-on cheer you just watched.

The Fighting Sullivans poster

The Negro Soldier1944

Made by the same US Army propaganda machine in the same year, it addresses race in the military directly — a serious, deliberate answer to the blackface number Berlin's film treats as a throwaway laugh.

A genuine US Army training documentary made to persuade Black soldiers and white audiences alike that the war effort included everyone — remarkable both as history and as a corrective to the era's usual blind spots.

But It's a short, functional propaganda documentary, not entertainment — go in for what it reveals, not for a good time.

The Negro Soldier poster

Five Came Back2017

This documentary series unpacks exactly how and why the Hollywood studio machine that made This Is the Army turned its directors into propagandists, giving you the industrial context behind Berlin's film.

Five major Hollywood directors, including Frank Capra and John Huston, went to war with cameras; this three-part documentary traces how their films became instruments of the war effort.

But It's serious, essay-like nonfiction with none of the songs — a history lesson, not a musical, and slower paced than anything else here.

Five Came Back poster

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Recommended by

White Christmas, Yankee Doodle Dandy, Stage Door Canteen, Hollywood Canteen, Private Buckaroo