The director, Alan Arkbush worked at the Fillmore East and Get Crazy is his tribute to that venue (and what a poor tribute it is). Get Crazy is set on December 31, 1982 and The Saturn (Fillmore) is in danger of being torn down to make room for a high rise office building. If the evil real estate baron gets his way, this will be the last New Year's Eve concert at the famous music hall.
There are a lot of musicians appearing in Get Crazy and they're the only reason I would recommend watching this disaster of a movie. Howard Kaylan of The Turtles plays Captain Cloud (think Jerry Garcia), who arrives with his band The Rainbow Telegraph in a bus that looks very similar to The Merry Pranksters Further bus. Lori Eastside from Kid Creole and The Coconuts is joined by Lee Ving (of the punk band Fear) who plays a character named Piggy (as in Iggy Pop) . Bill Henderson plays King Blues, a ripoff of any great blues artists you might think of and Malcolm McDowell does a great job as a composite of Mick Jagger/David Bowie and his drummer Toad is played by John Densmore of The Doors. Lou Reed plays a version of Bob Dylan and when we first see him in Get Crazy, he's in a set reminiscent of Dylan's Bringing It All Back Home album cover. Teen Idols Fabian and Bobby Sherman do not perform, but have roles as henchmen to the real estate developer.
It's beyond me how the director of Rock n Roll High School, one of the best and goofiest Rock movies ever made, could have made a movie as bad as Get Crazy. Filled with tons of sight gags that would only be humorous to 10-12 year old kids (and even they may be too old for this type of humor),this movie is terrible from start to finish. Even Arkbush, the directo,r has commented he wanted to make a realistic movie about a venue like The Fillmore, but the producer forced him into making an Airplane! type movie. I waited years to see this out of print movie, since it was loaded with so many great musical stars...what a major disappointment. I have read that Get Crazy has a cult following, all I can say is what kind of kool-aid are they drinking.
Thunder Alley was the last movie Annette Funicello made for American International Pictures, purveyor of The Beach Party Movies, and except for a bit part in Head, she didn't appear in another major motion picture until 20 years later when she re-teamed with Frankie Avalon for Back To The Beach. Annette wasn't idle during that period, she made appearances in numerous TV shows. Her appearance in Thunder Alley was her most adult role in any of the AIP films, even more so than in Fireball 500, and like that movie, Thunder Alley has a stock car racing theme. This time out her usual co-star/love interest Frankie Avalon was replaced with Fabian
Like Avalon in Fireball 500, Fabian also tools around in a George Barris customized car. As you can see from the above photo, his Dodge Charger is a pretty ugly piece of machinery. It seems Fabian always gets black-outs when he gets boxed in during a race and his last black-out caused the death of another racer. He finds the only person who will hire him is Jan Murray, who runs a Thrill Show (similar to Joie Chitwood's Thrill Show) and can use another driver.
Annette plays Jan Murray's daughter and she also drives in his Thrill Show. As you would expect, Annette and Fabian, at first, can't stand each other, but eventually fall in love. Both Annette and Fabian did great with their parts, with one exception. Part of the plot called for Annette to get drunk and whether Annette had never been drunk or just didn't have the acting chops to play drunk is undecidable. However, this is the only weak spot in Annette's acting in Thunder Alley.
Fabian has no songs in Thunder Alley and Annette sings only one song, "When You Get What You Want", a very slow and plaintive song, accompanied by The Band Without A Name (who later changed their name to The American Revolution). The Band Without A Name also does the title song to the movie "Thunder Alley".
I found Thunder Alley to be the least enjoyable of any of the Beach Party offshoots. It moved slow and the story was predictable. I would recommend it only to anyone interested in seeing some vintage stock car racing and/or Thrill Show footage.
Fireball 500 on the surface appears to be a continuation of the Beach Party movies, since it stars Annette Funicello and Frankie Avalon and co-stars Harvey Lembeck. Besides featuring those three actors, the film has little to do with the Beach Party series. I say little, since Frankie does sing over the opening and closing credits, along with another song in the middle of the movie and Annette also gets to do one song.
Frankie is a famous race car driver who tools around in a George Barris customized 1966 Plymouth Barracuda, towing his race car behind him. He winds up in a town with a stock car race sponsored by Harvey Lembeck. The racetrack has an attached carnival where Annette works for her father Chill Wills, who runs a "hoochie coochie" show. Fabian (who inexplicably doesn't sing in the movie) is Annette's main squeeze. In a plot throwback to the beach movies, Annette wants Fabian to settle down and quit his wild racing ways. I guess it goes without saying that Fabian and Frankie become rivals, not only for Annette, but also on the racetrack.
Fireball 500 has a subplot about moonshine running (shades of Thunder Road) and while Fabian has no problem running "shine", Frankie gets tricked into taking a moonshine run. When the revenuers threaten Frankie with jail time, he has to help them arrest the suppliers.
Fireball 500 is a lot more adult in theme than the movies normally associated with Frankie and Annette. Annette still maintains her "goody two shoes" image for most of the movie, the exception being when she sings "Step Right Up" for her father's girlie show. Frankie, on the other hand, drinks hard liquor and even though the movie only gives you a hint of what happens, it's pretty obvious he has shacked up with a woman in his hotel room.
While it was good to see some old-style stock car racing footage, as opposed to the boring NASCAR professional racing of today, Fireball 500 wasn't very entertaining. Some of the supporting actors were so good it made Annette and Frankie's acting look pretty amateurish, although Fabian held his own with the rest of the cast. The plot mash-up of beach movie with the previously mentioned Thunder Road was weak and even the songs were insipid. Given the choice I'd watch any of Annette and Frankie's beach movies over Fireball 500.
