Remember when I hit 1000 reviews? Sure, that was fun. Kind of takes away a lot from hitting 1050. But damn it, I promised a larger review every 50, to keep things interested, and that is what I will keep doing!
Because 1050 is incredibly lackluster of a Milestone Review, I wanted to go for what appeared to be a completely lackluster movie. Another Disney Channel Original Movie.
The last milestones similar to this one were of course my High School Musicals review, and the spin-off, Sharpay’s Fabulous Adventure.
So, besides Disney Channel Original Movie, it is similar in other ways. It has music, and it has an extremely generic name. I mean, High School Musical is technically about a high school musical, but the name also describes the movie…a musical set in a high school. Teen Beach Movie takes the generic-ness up a few levels and gives us Teen Beach Movie. Holy fuck, they aren’t even trying anymore.
Yeah, definitely looks like they have given up.
Upon even further remembrance, fuck, I already reviewed a different teach beach musical movie. From Justin To Kelly. Shit, there are a lot of these types of movies in my milestone reviews.
So this movie is about two kids, Brady (Ross Lynch) and McKenzie/Mack (Maia Mitchell). They are enjoying the summer before Junior year of high school. They are surfing having a blast and being all lovey dovey. Well, disaster strikes!
Mack’s aunt (Suzanne Cryer) is here to take her away! She agreed to go to a fancy boarding school her last two years, to get into a good college and start being awesome. Boo! Brady is sad! She is leaving before the big perfect condition waves tomorrow, too!
NO. NOW IS NOT THE TIME FOR JAZZ HANDS. THIS IS SAD TIME!
Well, ever conflicted, she still goes on the waves missing her flight, but still planning to move. Unfortunately, the waves get SO CRAZY HUGE OMG! Brady goes to save her when she falls off her board, and when they emerge from the wave, they find themselves in the 1960s.
No, they haven’t just time traveled, they have become part of the very “famous” movie, Wet Side Story. Yes, a fictional movie, based on West Side Story, which is based on Romeo and Juliet. Basically, the only real similarities to West Side Story is singing/dancing rival gangs, and the love interest between the two.
This time the gangs are “bikers” vs surfers. Much fierce.
So, these kids are transported into a musical, where everything is happy go lucky and sunshine lollipops. The actual movie isn’t. Just the movie in the movie.
Ho. Ly. Fuck.
This movie is a mother fucking parody. A parody of not only West Side Story, but also I can sense a lot of Grease in here. But even more importantly, this movie is a parody on High School Musical. All of them. Disney Channel is parodying their own movie. They even have their own Zac Efron looking mother fucker.
And he’s fabulouuuuuuuuuuusssssss.
That’s not all. They have half the cast of High School Musical in here. Not actually, just people who remind me of them. That main chick Mack? She has some Vanessa Hudgens characteristics.
Anyways, their existence in the movie messes things up. The two romantic leads ends up falling in love with them instead of each other! Oh no! Now the rift between the two gangs will never be saved!
Lela (Grace Phipps) is the biker chick lover, brother of head biker dude Butchy (John DeLuca, who looks like Josh Peck).
Tanner (Garrett Clayton) is our Efron, main singer for the beach goers.
Aww, how are they going to fix this beach time love madness? Through song?!
Why does it matter? Well, stuff that belongs to the two main kids start to disappear. If they can’t fix the plot, the movie can’t finish and they might be stuck in it forever.
The good news is, because they are in a movie, they have things to work with, such as movie magic. So, scenes change easily, and costumes come freely. Mack has also decided to introduce woman’s rights while she is here, because all the girls only talk about boys. It is annoying to her.
“Bitch, I am still fabulous. Talk more about me!”
I dunno. Then some more stuff happens. Songs, love games. Oh, I guess there are also villains here. A Les Camembert (Steve Valentine) and Dr. Fusion (Kevin Chamberlin). They are building a machine to change the weather to chase those beach rats and bikers away from their homes. Mwhahaha!
I guess that is important. If the two groups don’t befriend each other, there is no way they will be able to stop them!
Science is the real enemy here.
Eh, there are other people in this movie too. Like Barry Bostwick, who plays Brady’s (dad? grandpa?). The only reason he deserves this note is that it is fucking Brad from Rocky Horror Picture Show, all old though. These sneaky Disney bastards, paying tribute to older musicals like this.
Chrissie Fit is also in this, as a biker head lady as well. And Jordan Fisher plays the best friend of not-Efron. And yes, he looks like the black guy from High School Musical, aka, Efron’s friend.
Seriously, this can’t be a coincidence right?
Alright, let’s look at this here movie.
I assumed it would be a train wreck. A terrible invention. The fact that I even knew it existed because it had some ads at the local movie theater, and it looked terrible.
But as a parody? A satire on the older musicals and lifestyles presented in them? Well, it works. I am not saying this is a fantastic movie, no, but it has its moments.
The songs are all incredibly cheesy, but again, it makes sense given the movie. There wasn’t one that was particularly atrocious, they were all at least okay minus the first one where I was still flabbergasted at what was happening. My favorite two songs would have to be Can’t Stop Singing, where are main two leads realize they can’t get out of the musical and are forced to sing and dance (while singing and dancing about it). And Like Me, which felt very Grease-y and was just overly ridiculous, and reminded me of the parody songs from the South Park episode Elementary School Musical.
It has obvious issues, yes. The graphics were horrible, and thus every surf scene was horrible. The singing was clearly done ahead of time, which is standard, but these no name actors did bad at lip syncing in my eyes. The acting itself was cringe worthy at times too, ignoring the on purpose cheese factors.
But fuck, it was a decent showing and parody.