It's a little difficult to grasp the notion of Danny Kaye, one of his era's premier farceurs, being the lead in a story from the 1840s by a Russian dramatist. We all know those Russian plays had more clouds of gray than any song by George Gershwin could guarantee. But, though I haven't read Gogol's story, he was one of those gloomy Russkies who happened to have a sense of humor, sarcastic and cynical though it might have been.
It's the Napoleonic era in Middle Europe. Every town in the regime is corrupt in varying degrees and Napoleon has sent an Inspector General to clean things up. The Inspector General has Napoleon's power of attorney. He generally enters a town in some humble disguise -- a tinker, a salesman, an utter nobody -- then snoops around until he uncovers the miscreants, who he then promptly hangs. Nobody knows what he looks like.
Kaye is a shill for a snake oil salesman, Walter Slezak in the most outrageously villainous bad-guy make up since Mack Swain, Chaplin's gorilla. When Kaye tries to stop an old lady from spending all her money on Slezak's cure-all to save her dying husband -- it's really furniture polish -- Slezak overhears the conversation and kicks Kaye out.
Kaye then turns into a starving tramp. He wanders from town to town, trying to steal bits of food from dogs. But in the village of Brodny, misleading evidence comes to light that he is the Inspector General in disguise. So instead of being hanged for a thief, he's feted by the terrified corrupt town officials. He spends most of the movie strutting around in resplendent garb, trying to imitate a self-possessed pal of Napoleon or, alternatively, trying desperately to have his real identity hidden from the public. This spoiled identity becomes especially problematic after Slezak shows up, recognizes him for the buffoon he is, and manipulates him to extort bribes from the officials.
Kaye handles the role pretty well, actually, as unlikely as it sounds. Well, why not? So it's a farce. I doubt that Gogol's original play had the fake Inspector General singing gibberish songs, but somehow it fits. Kaye's usual cowardly and neurotic persona is imposed on what I imagine to have been an amusing but relatively grounded story. If W. C. Fields could play Mr. Micawber in Charles Dickens' "David Copperfield", why not Kaye as a jiggling and stuttering Inspector General? The plot is too logical to allow for many of Kaye's set pieces. The gibberish songs (by his then-wife, Sylvia Fine) aren't as funny as some of his earlier ones. The gags, though muted, are imposed on a narrative that is funny in itself and this makes up, to some extent, for our watching a Danny Kaye who is in harness to the plot.
There isn't as much mindless sentiment as there were in some of Kaye's lesser vehicles -- no sick children or any of that crap. Barbara Bates as the housemaid is Kaye's love interest, such as it is. Bates, an exquisite young woman of modest talent, was the underhanded high-school girl Phoebe who shows up at the end of "All About Eve." Here, in period wardrobe, she's just another pretty face, but it doesn't matter because her part isn't particularly important.
Anyway, I kind of enjoyed it. Kaye does a lot of jumping around and shuffling of objects and there are some laughs in it, desperately needed in these too-laughless times.
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