mhrabovsky1-1

Pathetic ripoff on the AIP beach party movies with Annette Funicello and Frankie Avalon....why blame UA studios for making this fluff...if it worked for AIP and made money it could do it for UA too....didn't take too much of a budget to turn out these teen age frolics, just a bunch of beach scenes with unknowns dancing around twisting their arms and fannies and staring sexually at each other. James Darren as much a staple in the beach/teenage movies as Frankie Avalon reprises Avalon's role and Pamela Tiffin (whatver became of her???) takes on Annette's role as the lame brained, boy chaser of James Darren. Ironic to see Ginger (Tina Louise) and Bob Denver (Gilligan) in this film playing two knuckleheads about a year or two before they signed on to do "Gilligan's Island". These teenage/beach party movies were all the same, zero acting, boys chasing girls and vice versa, a few guitar tunes, some goofy adults thrown in trying to control the beach set and oversee their kids/relations. Watch this fluff, or any of the Frankie/Annette movies, "Get Yourself a College Girl", "Ski Party", "Surf Party", "Hooteanny Hoot", "Ride the Wild Surf" with Fabian, and you would not know which film is which. Cant blame the studios....these films were made with tiny budgets and the teenagers of American flocked to the theatres/drive ins to suck them up. Made a ton of money for a little investment. Poor Paul Lynde stuck in this film...he was given little to work with and played second fiddle to a mildly successful 60s comedian, Woody Woodbury. He tried hard to be funny but came on more as a bore than a laugh. Nancy Sinatra in one of her first roles playing a coed chasing the boys, ala Bob Denver. Pamela Tiffin had fake eyelashes on in this film that looked about 3 inches too long....she and Darren reunited the same year in "The Lively Set", a film about car racing...diss the beach in this one. As the 60s progressed these films went totally out of style with the hippie/drug culture taking over America. Still this stuff was great drive in material during the 60s...you will like this film if you were a teenager in the early 60s.....

It is sort of sad that Van Heflin did not get his due as a western actor, especially during the 1950s...most people think of Burt Lancaster, Audie Murphy, Fred McMurray, James Stewart, maybe Gary Cooper too...but Heflin made two total classics in the 50s, "Shane" with Allen Ladd, and "3:10 to Yuma" with Glenn Ford another noted 50s western star...also he was a iron clad major in "They Came to Cordura" in 59....in "The Raid" he is a rebel officer with a dual role, as he contrives with a band of rebel soldiers to overtake a small Vermont town toward the end of the civil war...further raids into unprotected towns by the rebels were planned to loot money and goods to be diverted into funds to buy war goods from foreign countries....Some very solid actors, very early in their careers make this a top notch wester, Lee Marvin, Peter Graves, James ("Roscoe") Best, Ann Bancroft, and a young Richard Boone, the man with the craggy face and disposition he made a career of....also a young Tommy Rettig, who went on to star in the "Lassie" TV series of the 1950s stars.... This is a top notch western and a true story to boot. Historical news reports from historians verify the raid on Vermont as a true civil war story. Lee Marvin in a good role as a renegade rebel solider who makes more trouble for Heflin that he bargained for as he gets drunk and threatens to blow up the whole "raid".....lots of plots and subplots....surreal part of this film is the rebel soldiers who were riding around with nitro glycerin in their pants and coats used to start fires in the town...everyone knows nitro is highly explosive to vibrations, whew!!! This is a very enjoyable civil war tale with top notch actors. Remember seeing this movie as a kid in 1954, but TV version of this film left me scratching my head as I remember Tommy Rettig coming into Heflin's room and seeing his rebel uniform in a chest, not on Heflin as he wore it in a hotel room.....did I miss something from seeing this film in a theatre as opposed to on TV...hard to figure. A good, solid 1950s western to see.