THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH
d. Del Tenney, 1964

7 January 2009

Bob Wilkins died today. This was not a shock, as the fans had known he'd been ill for a while. After hearing about it from my friend A.R., I wasn't sure at first what I was feeling or how, if at all, to mark the event. But a few hours later, I got a 24-ounce Sierra Nevada from the snack bar*, listened to Gotham City Swing Band once, and then put on THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH - the first film aired on Bob's KTVU show, Creature Features, back in 1971.

I was 15 in 1971. THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH was a film I'd known about since I was 8, due to it having been turned into a photo-comic by Warren Publications. If it had ever played The Bay Area, I had missed it, but the ads for that photo-comic haunted my childhood. Not only had I never seen the movie, but I'd never managed to get a copy of the photo-comic.

* Yes, the snack bar at The Old Dark Arthouse serves beer.

In other words, by the time THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH aired on Creature Features, I had been waiting half my life to see it. I had built up some tremendous expectations for it.

I was not disappointed. How could a film like this disappoint?

THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH begins as an almost - but - not - quite imitation of American International Pictures' Beach Party films. (The kids frolic at "Party Beach" presumably because AIP would have sued for the use of the term "Beach Party.")

The whole thing is suffused with a sense of familiarity colliding with other-than-ness.You can see what the film is going for, but the major enjoyment is to be had in seeing how it doesn't quite get there.

The Beach Party films are in color; THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH is in black and white. The Beach Party films' music is performed by the principals throughout the films in the manner of a musical; THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH's music is provided by a band performing their stage act at the outset of the film. The Beach Party movies were full of girls in bikinis, but were choreographed to be essentially chaste; THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH zooms in on the girls' asses whenever possible, and the dancing is much more overtly sexy.

THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH's big gimmick was to add atomic monsters. Atomic monsters were AIP's staple of the previous decade. The real Beach Party movies began including horror elements before long, as well. However, AIP kept the Beach Party horror campy. In THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH, while the monsters look laughably cheap, they act like the ghouls in NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. So you're already in an uneasy mix, a not-quite-AIP Beach Party at a slightly sleazier "Party Beach," when these rubber monsters show up and mutilate a slumber party in ways fairly graphic by 1964 standards.

This is all, of course, incredibly entertaining. Given its independent roots, skin and gore ahead of its time, and overall monsterific vibe, THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH belongs in a category with THE BRAIN THAT WOULDN'T DIE and THE FLESH EATERS. Noble companions.