Joe Holland Movies
Actor and screeenwriter Joe Holland launched his onscreen acting career in Back to the Beach (1987). The son of actress Joanna Carson, his student film Delirious earned him a Frank Capra Award. Holland occasionally dabbled in television, making guest appearances on shows such as the drama 21 Jump Street and Cheers. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello not only starred in the delightfully "retro" Back to the Beach, but also served as executive producers. Appropriately set 25 years after such drive-in faves as Beach Blanket Bingo, the film finds Frankie and Annette as husband and wife, living far from the surf 'n' sand in Ohio. Heading to California to visit their daughter Lori Loughlin, Frankie and Annette are appalled to learn that she has been keeping time with punker Tommy Hinkley. In time-honored fashion, our hero and heroine set about to make the beach safe for funlovers everywhere by driving out Hinkley's unsavory pals. Along the way, Frankie nearly bollixes up his marriage by dallying with Connie Stevens-one of several pop-culture icons appearing in Back to the Beach, including Don Adams, Bob Denver, Jerry Mathers, Tony Dow, Dick Dale & the Del-Tones , Stevie Ray Vaughan, and even Pee-wee Herman! Back to the Beach is fun for a while, but its six-person writing team can't figure out a logical way to wind it all up. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Frankie Avalon, Annette Funicello, (more)
- 1930
Filmed in "Fox Grandeur," an early widescreen process, Happy Days was the immediate follow-up to Fox Studios' Movietone Follies of 1929. Most of the film takes place on the showboat of Mississippi entrepreneur Colonel Billy Batcher (Charles E. Evans). When the Colonel faces foreclosure after several failing seasons, soubrette Margie (Marjorie White) stages a fund-raising revue on the boat, enlisting the aid of all the big stars who got their start with Batcher. By an amazing coincidence, virtually all of the showboat alumni are under contract to Fox Studios! Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell perform "We'll Build a Little World of Our Own," Victor McLaglen and Edmund Lowe kid their roughneck screen images in the novelty number "Vic and Eddie," Sharon Lynn and Ann Pennington offer the "hot" dance routine "Snake Hips," and "Whispering" Jack Smith offers a rendition of the title tune. Also on hand are Will Rogers, El Brendel, Walter Catlett (who also staged the musical numbers), Lew Brice (Fanny's brother), Dixie Lee (Mrs. Bing Crosby) and Georgie Jessel -- not to mention an uncredited 14-year-old chorus girl named Betty Grable. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
