Psycho Beach Party

Absurdity never seemed so straight and the straight and narrow never took so many turns. Psycho Beach Party is the most outrageous fun since Rocky Horror Picture Show hit the screen. Of all the films that poke fun at male-female, male-male, and female-female sexuality this summer, Psycho Beach Party takes the cake. The comparison is apt. Both films were adapted from successful small theatrical hits. Both films take innocence and sexuality to their extremes. What Rocky Horror did for monster movies, musicals and science fiction, Psycho Beach Party does to psychological thrillers, surfer/Gidget movies and slasher films. Charles Busch, the writer of the film and the play, has been New York's dirty little secret for over a decade. When Busch's "Vampire Lesbians of Sodom" was a hit downtown, I remember seeing people read the marquee, laugh, wince, then laugh again self consciously. Charles Busch brings this same combination of joy and guilt together wonderfully in Psycho Beach Party. He acts in it as well, he's the female detective that looks so damned good in that blue uniform. Its a shame theater doesn't inspire film as often as it once did. Theatrical dialogue, laced as it is the references and innuendo, requires a bit more suspension of disbelief from the audience. I'm not sure the "American Pie" generation is sophisticated enough to sit through something both silly and clever. Everyone shines in this cast, but no one outshines Chiclet. Let's leave it at that, in the wake of the "What Lies Beneath" fiasco, I'll leave the plot for people to discover. Unlike everyone at Universal Studios, I don't think people really want to know what happens before they go to the movies. Director Robert Lee King mocks the cinematic conceit of putting a film within a film not once but four times in less than a minute of screen time. It's a left, a right, a right, and a left knockout punch. And when you finish laughing about it -- King's little stunt will come back to haunt you later that night. Like Rocky Horror Picture Show, Psycho Beach Party is not the campy little trifle you thought you were being served...........

First things first: 'Psycho Beach Party' is funny, fresh, light-hearted and completely likable. It is a rare film that can walk the tight-rope between mocking a particular film genre (in this case, the "Beach Blanket" movies of the fifties and sixties) while still showing great affection for said genre. 'Psycho Beach Party' does it wonderfully. Using an obviously skewed view of these pleasant if vapid films, 'PBP' covers us in satirical humor and warmth, a tricky combination to pull off. If you have ever sat through a film in which a surf board was the star, check this one out...great fun.

Now, second: In response to Brian Bagnall's review from Canada, this film is NOT gay propoganda (just because the writer/director is gay does not make this a gay film). Gays do NOT have to have blonde hair (one of the only two agy characters has black hair...must have missed that one, huh, Brian?). The film does NOT portray the era as demeaning to women (the women in this film are some of the most empowered I have seen in a long time). And if you can not suspend your disbelief for long enough to watch our young heroine escape from a man twice her size, you probably should not be watching a film with the word "psycho", "beach", and "party" in the title. This film looks foundly back on a time that was simpler, both in the movies and reality. Anyone who gets anything other than a Genre Spoof from this was not paying attention.

Put simply, people; 'Psycho Beach Party' is Fabu!

I don't know why I had heard of this film, but I had. I don't know why I wanted to rent it, but I did. I don't know why I laughed all the way through it, but I did.... Yeah, I do know why I laughed. It was funny. It wasn't as purile as most modern "teen" comedies are, but it sure did have fun poking fun at the 60's beach movies like "Beach Blanket Bingo".

Charles Busch, who plays the part of the female detective, is absolutely a laugh riot: I truly believe he was channeling Kathleen Turner. The two hunky doofus boys who are more in love with each other than any of the babes...Nicholas Brendan, in a reverse take on his role on "Buffy", plays the major stud puppy here...Thomas Gibson in a reverse take on his televsion role as "Greg", plays a beatnik surfer dude. Beth Broderick, with her unbelievably sexy raspy voice, plays this films version of June Cleever with a twist.

The lines are outrageous. The costumes dead on. The portrayals ridiculous and accurate at the same time.

The is high camp! Don't expect serious - don't expect typical humor. But if you're over thirty, and remember those old beach movies, then you'll get a real blast out of this film.

Yes, a few of these viewers dont even seem to know the work of Charles Busch - the creator/writer and performer of Psycho Beach Party. Busch has a huge following in theatre (Psycho beach Party started a s a play)and all of his work is tongue-in-cheek and some of the complaints on these posts sound like people who wouldn't "get" Rocky Horror Picture Show or Plan 9 From Outer Space either. But that's okay - Busch's work is not for everyone - just like John Waters/Divine's work isnt for everyone. And this film adapatation certainly has it's weaknesses - but much of it is DEAD on - including the opening and closing credits with a young Ann-Margaret look-a-like doing her best go-go boot dancing. Busch is hysterical as the hard-as-nails "female" police chief and Lauen Ambrose has a field day playing the perky like Gidget with multiple personalities. The film is fun and if you like it, check on Busch in Die, Mommie, Die.

I've noticed the more recent the review for this film there is here, the worse it is. I'm wondering if it has something to do with age? A lot of X-ennials (people born from the late 70s to the mid-80s) remember when The Disney Channel and Nickelodeon were drenched in 1950s and 1960s nostalgia so that our parents and grandparents would feel comfortable with us watching it.

As a kid, I saw all the beach party movies (along with The Patty Duke Show, Ozzie and Harriet, and re-runs of the original Mickey Mouse Club) so I know exactly what this movie is about. The person who said Psycho Beach Party "makes fun of 1950s horror movie" is regrettably under 35.