The story could hardly be more familiar. A barracks worth of raw recruits from varying backgrounds arrive at Fort Bliss to go through basic training in the infantry. Widmark is the sterner of the two drill sergeants, Malden the more human, but both are friends, until . . . . Two plotlines are developed simultaneously. The first involves the mostly comic tribulations of the new grunts. They are by turns humiliated, worked to exhaustion, given to pillow fights and practical jokes on one another, as the sergeants attempt to "help you rid yourself of your winsome civilian ways". We are thankfully spared any involvement on their part with young women outside the camp. (The sort of thing, among other things, that positively ruined "Battle Cry.") Of course there has to be a romance, but it is left to Widmark and Malden, the two combat veterans who come to blows over Elaine Stewart, the pride of Montclair, New Jersey, as Julie. She's clearly more attracted to Widmark who is, after all, the male lead, but he professes to despise her because she hangs around in seedy juke joints, drinks, and makes out with soldiers like him. Malden is attracted to her too and, at least for one night, enjoys her favors, which Widmark notices. It annoys him. Widmark and Malden grow somewhat apart. Their irritation with one another increases as Widmark bears down harder on the recruits. His morality is lofty, of the "Nothing you experience in basic training will be as tough as combat," which may be true but which also provides a drill instructor with a license for outright sadism. Not to worry. The boys shape up and do some close order drill at the train platform before shipping out, leaving a new incoming group of recruits staring in awe. Julie leaves town, tearfully, by a train as well, no doubt to recapture her dignity. Widmark and Malden encounter each other on a dark street while returning from the train station, and Malden wordlessly offers Widmark a conciliatory cigarette. The processing machine grinds along and all is well. Widmark's character is oddly written. He quotes Elizabeth Barrett Browning while sneering that he's never read her. The only Browning my drill instructor ever heard of was made of metal.
