Hootenanny Hoot

Honestly I'm not sure how to rate this movie. I was laughing so hard at times I had tears in my eyes.

Any movie that tries so hard to be hip, but has a banjo in every other song, is doomed to the ridiculous.

The Hootenany circus, the grand finale of the movie, is maybe the most bizarre staging of musical numbers I have ever seen in a movie. The Gateway Trio singing "Foolish Questions" while bouncing up and down on a trampoline is the epitome of square.

On the other hand, Judy Henske torches her two songs in the movie. Wow! There's several other really strong songs as well, and also a few that are snooze inducers. The choreography is a strange mix of early Rock n' Roll, Broadway, and Hee Haw. All rolled together, the dancing is kind of great.

The plot and acting are awful, the sets cheap as can be. But if you're in a silly mood and like folk music, it's quite a movie, and I'll recommend it to you.

For just plain old laughs, this is great. This film my wife and I laughed at for most of the picture. I love it when a movie is SO cornie that it becomes laughable. What makes watching it more enjoyable is knowing that many of the actors probably saw this as their "big break" into the movies! Did people really dance like that? The music was good on the serious side, and it does serve as a period piece of film, though exaggerated.

I recommend this film for anyone who wants to have a light laugh. It isn't the best for a plot, and it really just tries to showcase the artists. If you like folk/country from the early 60s, this has some really good music.

This plot goes back AT LEAST to the big-band era. A promoter or reporter or minor producer who is under pressure at his radio network/TV network/record label/newspaper/etc.to come up with a blockbuster new concept or show discovers a new trend in music, helps some deserving up-and-coming performers get a break, and often finds (or rekindles) romance. In Don't Knock The Twist, Lang Jeffries played the promoter--here it's Peter Breck. In some of the Ron Ormond-produced "Jubilee" pictures it was Don Barry or Jimmy Ellison. In Good to Go it was Art Garfunkel. Like the Bill Haley rock'n'roll movies of the mid-50s or the Chubby Checker twist movies of the early-60s, this is a Sam Katzman production, meaning it will be shot on a few cheap sets and will feature a number of semi-talented unknowns along with the better artists, but also it will have a number of excellent supporting actors to carry the "plot" elements. Here we have Peter Breck, Ruta Lee, Joby Baker, and Bobo Lewis as the female comic relief. Not surprisingly, this film and Don't Knock The Twist AND the Bill Haley vehicle Rock Around The Clock were all written by Robert E. Kent, but he's working from a template that was old at the time. So how's the music? Well, the title song by Sheb Wooley (in its full version, heard later in the film) as a fine rockin' number, Johnny Cash's version of Frankie and Johnny is solid, Judy Henske does an intense version of Wade In The Water with the support of avant-garde male dancers, the black gospel-folk duo Joe and Eddie do a fantastic anthemic number, and George Hamilton IV does his hit Abilene. The "humorous" clean-cut folk of the Brothers Four doesn't really work for me, and some of the lesser acts have not dated well and seem to have somewhat shallow roots. Don't expect to see Dave Van Ronk, Phil Ochs, Ramblin' Jack Elliott or Dylan here--there's a line of dialogue about how the show they are producing will not include any of those coffeehouse, beatnik types!! Gene Nelson, an actor and dancer before becoming a director, has helmed a number of excellent films, but he must have been given few resources and a very limited number of days' shooting time here as the mismatched close-ups and casual framing of shots are not what one expects in an MGM release, even a bottom-of-the-bill drive-in release such as this one. Overall, a historical artifact of interest to Johnny Cash completists and popular culture fanatics who would actually want to see a "Rock Around the Clock"-type movie about the 1960s pop-folk revival scene (recently depicted nostalgically in A MIGHTY WIND). I'm glad I saw this once, but I don't think I'll be putting it on again unless I live to be 150!

Forget the plot. As far as that goes, be prepared for another Sam Katzman exploitive quickie designed to cash in on whatever was hot at the moment. In this case, it was the pop-folk boom that effectively began with the Kingston Trio's "Tom Dooley" in 1958 and lasted roughly about five years, until just before the start of the British Invasion.

The music, however, is another matter, and you'd do best to just fast forward through the droning dialogue to catch solid early performances by Johnny Cash, the Brothers Four (looking and sounding good even when bouncing on trampolines during one number), George Hamilton IV (singing his # 1 hit, "Abilene") and Judy Henske, among others. Everyone gives good performances despite, or perhaps in reaction to, the overall cheesiness surrounding them.

In short, musically I give this film an 8, otherwise one half of one.

I watched this bit of harmless nonsense on TCM. I remember the "hootenanny fad" and oddly did not recall this movie at all. Seeing a young Johhny Cash was a treat, although I'd hardly classify his music as part of the hootenanny craze. Likewise for Sheb Wooley, what no "Purple People Eater", and George Hamilton IV or whatever number he was. The Brothers 4 I recall, but other performers I do not remember at all. The format reminded me of the rock and roll movies with Alan Freed and a few others. Extremely corny, but a record of some of the music of the times !