THE BEACH GIRLS AND THE MONSTER (1965)

THE BEACH GIRLS AND THE MONSTER (1965)

Tagline: Beach party lovers make hey! hey! in the moonlight...while the Monster lurks in the shadows!

(Horror, Teenagers, Singing Goofy Songs On the Beach) [PG]

Note: This movie was not given an MPAA rating. I believe it would have landed a PG rating just due to the “horror “element. 

I tell ya, sheriff, something has gotta be done about them, the boys are nothing but a bunch of loafers and the girls are little tramps. They contribute absolutely nothing to a decent society. 

The story in this one revolves around a girl that is killed on the beach is had severe gashes that look inhuman. Professor Otto Lindsay speculates that it may be some sort of mutated fish, but no one knows for sure. It doesn’t take long before more bodies turn up and the suspicions turn towards the idea that the murders are targeted, and Professor Otto’s son Richard begins to think there may be a madman on the loose. 

First off, let me be clear. There is absolutely no good acting in this movie. The monster suit is ridiculous and glorious at the same time and sadly this one takes a turn I kind of wish it hadn’t. This is not to say that I don’t think the movie was entertaining, because it is wildly entertaining. I am apparently not the only one saying that. It is actually listed as one of the top 100 most enjoyable “bad movies” and won a Golden Raspberry Award according to the OFFICIAL RAZZIE MOVIE GUIDE. 

After the opening sequence, we do get a ton of talking which becomes overly tedious just because a lot of the dialog is unnecessary to the plot and feels like filler. This film also contains a decent amount of unrequested surf stock footage with surf music playing in the background. Also every “kid” or “teen” in this movie looks at least in their late 20’s to 30’s. On top of all this, we get a crazy scene where 3 grown dudes are riding in the front seat of a car. I don’t know that I have ever seen that in a flick, even from this era. Then we get a nighttime beach party where everyone is sitting around singing songs that are just mind-blowingly hilarious. It’s so wonky, that if you took the parts out where the monster shows up, you would just have a teeny bopper beach movie, only pretty much everyone is an adult. 

The monster design itself is fine but fits more into the THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH movie than THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON. As far as I can tell, this was the first of only two films directed by Jon Hall, the other one was THE NAVY VS. THE NIGHT MONSTERS for which he was uncredited. Hall was an accomplished actor though staring in 48 productions. He actually plays Dr. Otto Lindsay in this movie. Arnold Lessing plays Richard Lindsay and does a fair job. Lessing was only in 8 movies and TV projects altogether but did get to play a security guard in the original STAR TREK TV series. Gloria Neil plays Bunny who gets very little screen time and is just okay. She was in several TV shows including “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.”. Then to round out the notable cast we also get Elaine DuPont as Jane. DuPont was most famous for the horror comedy GHOST OF DRAGSTRIP HOLLOW. 

Overall this is a pretty wild one but had a few lulls that probably could have been filled with more beach party stuff and done the film some favors. I did enjoy it though even with some of the more serious tones toward the end of the movie. If you want to have a pretty crazy outdoor horror-themed hangout night with some friends with a projector and a couple of fun movies playing in the background, this thing and THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH are highly recommended. 

This one gets a 5 out of 7 mostly because I wouldn’t mind watching it again and it had my attention the entire time.

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