The original adventures of Hawkeye Pierce, Duke Forrest and Trapper John McIntyre in the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital in Korea put Robert Altman's name, and some of the rudiments of his quirky method, on the map. It was a blasphemous film in which gallows (or operating-table) humor combined with blood-and-guts visuals, and the ever-present squawk-box on the soundtrack, to assault rather than soothe the senses of a nation shattered by the Vietnam War and tattered by the media. If M*A*S*H is Bilko-goes-to-Vietnam, it's funnier because its comedy is truly situational: as the characters go about their business of proving that heroics and authority are antithetical entities, Altman and scriptwriter Ring Lardner, Jr. invest them with bristling, naturalistic dialogue to distinguish the humans amid a wide screen's worth of chaotic imagery.