1h 12min | Comedy, Drama, Musical | November 1956 | b/w, fs
Director: Edward L. Cahn
Stars: Mike Connors, Lisa Gaye, Sterling Holloway, Fats Domino, Douglass Dumbrille, Margaret Dumont.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049749/
Watched online, ok print.
9 songs in the Soundtrack. The most familiar: Ain't That a Shame.
14th film for Mike (Touch, from his college bball days) Connors, released immediately after The Ten Commandments ('56). Of his 35 films, only 12 of them are rated 6 or better on IMDb, and 11 of them rate under 5. He (b. 1925) plays a (TV?) disc jockey, promoting gang harmony through R'n'R music and dancing (still jitterbug). SH plays the hipster sidekick.
Yes, LG was in the prior R'n'R film, Rock Around the Clock ('56). Here she is merely MC's romantic interest, and does not dance. From the titles, this may be her last rocksploitation film.
The plus on this rating is for the H'wood majors appearing here, especially DD & MD, and only as a curiosity. The plot is dull, with DD, MD, et al mounting a campaign to squash the R'n'R TV show, concerts, etc. It becomes a court case (why is does the courtroom have a kitchen behind the clients' table? Are we in the TV studio?), which is good publicity for the show. The "evidence" includes films of aborigines dancing, and flappers from the 20's, supposedly including a young MD. (But MD (b. 1882) would have been over 40 in the flapper days.)
As expected from an AIP release (American International Pictures, among the poverty row "studios", they produced some films in 60's & 70's), this is a bare-looking production. I suspect that DD & MD were willing to work cheap then, especially if filming was quick.
Sunset Prod., distr. AIP, dir. Cahn; 5+
