Don't Give Up the Ship is a 1959 American black-and-white U.S. Navy comedy film from Paramount Pictures, produced by Hal B. Wallis, directed by Norman Taurog, that stars Jerry Lewis and co-stars Dina Merrill, Diana Spencer, Claude Akins, Robert Middleton, Gale Gordon, and Mickey Shaughnessy.

The film was based on the Alcoa Theatre episode Souvenir aired on Dec 2, 1957 starring Jack Lemmon that was written by Ellis Arnold Kadison.

Kadison's idea was based on Edward Anhalt then serving with the Army Air Force First Motion Picture Unit in Culver City, California signing for a captured German Messerschmidt that was to be used as a prop in a training film.

Lieutenant John Paul Steckler VII, the last of a long line of good-natured but screw-up U.S. Navy officers, was tasked with commanding the Kornblatt to its decommission back in the U.S., but somehow the ship disappeared without a trace on its homeward voyage.

Just as he is ready to embark on a honeymoon with his freshly wedded wife Prudence, Steckler is tracked down by Navy personnel and brought to the Pentagon, where he is charged with treason and malevolent misappropriation of government property.

Since he is at a loss to explain the whereabouts of the ship, Steckler is teamed up with Naval Intelligence operative Ensign Benson, who happens to be an attractive woman.

In a flashback, it is told that on the day hostilities in the Pacific were finally ended, the Kornblatt was ordered to return to Pearl Harbor for the decommissioning of those crew members with sufficient discharge points.