When I first heard about this movie, the first half of Austin & Ally Season one was pretty much finished, and I thought Disney was just milking Ross Lynch's fame for another "High School Musical" sequel. Thank God my earlier perceptions turned out to be false. Instead, this DCOM spoofed early-1960's Beach Party flicks, the kinds of movies that came out before the majority of Disney Channel viewers were ever born, and that were on the verge of decline when I was born. So while I naturally was concerned that the intended audience may not get it and would only be interested in it because of Lynch, I still realized this was going to be as corny as all hell, and I was proved right. For the record, yes kids; these movies did have ridiculous cartoon villains like Les Camembert and Dr. Fusion and characters with corny names like "Giggles," and battles between surfers and biker gangs with ridiculous names like "The Rodents," who spoke in 1930's Lower East Side white gangster dialects, even though none of the gang members have ever been east of Arizona.
Brady (Lynch) and MacKenzie (Maia Mitchell) are a contemporary California surfing boyfriend and girlfriend who are having a fun summer and are anticipating the ultimate waves, even as she anticipates and dreads a potential prep school trip that may end their relationship. When Brady isn't surfing, one of the things he likes to do is watch an early-1960's beach party movie called "Wet Side Story," which is obviously "West Side Story" moved to the west coast. Brady and MacKenzie's grandfather(Barry Bostwick) love the movie in spite of the corniness of it and others like it, while Mac herself ridicules the whole thing. I love her general attitude towards it throughout most of the movie.
When Brady and Mac's grandpa notice a storm coming, Brady tries to rescue her, but they both wipe out and end up in his favorite movie. They catch the cast performing the opening theme "Surf Crazy," and Brady is more than eager to join in while Mac's REALLY not into it. After the theme, the surfers hang out at a local beach bar & grille called "Big Momma's" and that local biker gang I mentioned earlier barges in and wants to take it over. The leader of this gang is named Butchy (John DeLuca), and his way of telling the surfers how things are going to go down is done in the form of a song. Brady sees Butchy and his gang perform the song "Cruzin' for a Bruzin'" then jumps in and completely takes it over, and nobody questions it. Actually, I'd go so far as to say it's Ross himself taking over, because I almost could swear he broke character the same way Charlie Chaplin did at the end of "The Great Dictator." Again, the movie is a west-coast surfing version of "West Side Story," so it involves the head surfer (Garrett Clayton) and the sister of the leader of the pack (Grace Phipps) falling in love during a musical number. But while the two real life lovers are arguing about how to get out of the movie, they end up falling into the arms of the characters in the movie, and completely change the whole thing. Both now realize they're in deep doo-doo and have to change everything back to the way it was.
Later on, they find the evil villains working in an abandoned lighthouse. where a real estate tycoon (Steve Valentine), and a mad scientist (Kevin Chamberlin) are using a weather machine to screw up the beach so they can take it over and build a resort hotel. "And this thing never won an Oscar." Oh, Maia, you have the best lines. Of course, Brady and Mac spend much of the movie trying to get the two fictional star-crossed lovers back together with little success. Mac is invited to the Rodent girls slumber party, and as they're all dressing up for their boyfriends, she introduces them to a new concept; Asking the guy you like out yourself. Brady also tries to hang out with the surfers to talk Tanner into not letting the fact that Lela's a biker-girl keep him from going out with her. This sets up another musical number that's some have described as being reminiscent of "Grease" which is a little disturbing, but it still plays up how phony the whole scene is, especially during the bridge of the song. As for me, I'm more into girls who look like Mac... before they gave her the biker-girl makeover.
As if it doesn't get far-fetched enough for our heroine, she suddenly realizes the movie itself is forcing her to sing a song. "Can't Stop Singing" is one of the highlights of the movie reflecting how ridiculous the whole thing is. This is one of the points I think many detractors are missing. It's not meant to be "Citizen Kane," "To Kill a Mockingbird," or "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," and like the kinds of movies it's making fun of, none of them really were. While not without flaws of it's own, it's just a fun TV movie that happens to be a loving parody of a genre of movies that were around before cable TV existed. So don't fret. Just see it for what it is.
