Perfectly adorable

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

This is a funny little cartoon where Donald Duck is serving in the military as a private, out on a very long training march. It's funny seeing him grow exhausted as he treads through the desert and snow until he and his fellow solders finally reach their camp. When Donald must follow orders to pitch his tent first before dinner, the tent won't cooperate and results in classic funny Donald frustration. Even during bed time, Donald has trouble with the uncooperative tent and the loud snores of his fellow soldiers. Funny stuff here and it's just classic and hilarious how Donald deals with his mishaps. At the end, Donald shows some great endurance as he almost gets no sleep and is told to march on - strong-willed like a real soldier!Grade A

Another of the WW2 Donald Duck pictures, though there's no combat here, and not even Pete this time as his adversary (in a number of them he was, like The Vanishing Private and the Old Army Game). The elements here are gag-related, but it's all about some fundamentals for this Duck, and so director Jack King puts our beloved fowl into a series of increasingly frustrating scenarios. Of course he directed a ton of Donald Duck shorts, probably his forte at the studio, and this sounds like nothing new. But the genius here is to make it all pretty basic, and for things to actually start out kind of light compared to what's to come; Donald's just walking, going through the various elements of cold, heat, rain, scalding heat, dust... and then it's time to eat, but he can't until he makes up his tent. This struggle becomes fruitless - it's the middle of the night once he gets it - and then he can't sleep.It's the battle of the elements, in other words, and that struggle of the soldier to have to keep it up. It's not even that this Duck is all that much of a light-sleeper (there's actually another cartoon, I forget the name, where a similar situation happens but in Donald's own home). The conflict and the great bounty of gags comes in just seeing how this duck can't find the moment to go to sleep - the other soldiers with their noisy feet on the drums or the snores that sound like cannon-fire certainly don't help - and that it's easily relatable. There's no clear villain here, only the problem of trying to live a decent day-to-day existence. That sounds trite or too simple, but the animators do fantastic work in bringing you on this Duck's side, keeping you there, and making it funny, moment to moment and beat to beat.

Donald is now quickly learning the drudgery of the Army (um...isn't this supposed to PROMOTE it?). He's now singing his little song anymore and is quite miserable. His platoon are on some kind of marching mission. A long, long, long trek across valleys, mountains and deserts.He's last in line and is not coping as well as the other troops. And when they finally make a camp Donald misses out on supper because he cannot make his tent. It is rather funny and I always have sympathy for Donald when everything goes wrong (then why am I laughing?) and the music is rather creative, making the most of beats, drums and the marching motif. Quite infectious.

What makes this particular cartoon great is that everyone watching it can empathize with Donald. Donald portrays a WWII army soldier in training. He and his platoon go on a 40-plus mile hike. He goes through all of the emotions which many of the GIs would have experienced. Even if you weren't a soldier, the idea of continually doing something until you're past exhaustion is something we can all relate to. It also shows the folks back home some of what training was like.The animation, especially the backgrounds spoofing John Ford films, is beautifully done.If you'd like to see more cartoons of this type, check out "Walt Disney on the Front Lines." This DVD collection includes over 30 short animation films. In addition, it includes the full-length feature "Victory through Air Power."