A family of ragtag vagabonds sets up a makeshift home on a Florida beach after becoming marooned there, prompting an uptight local bureaucrat to attempt to evict them.A family of ragtag vagabonds sets up a makeshift home on a Florida beach after becoming marooned there, prompting an uptight local bureaucrat to attempt to evict them.A family of ragtag vagabonds sets up a makeshift home on a Florida beach after becoming marooned there, prompting an uptight local bureaucrat to attempt to evict them.
- Director
- Writers
- Stars
- Jack
- (as Frank de Kova)
- Man
- (uncredited)
- Governor
- (uncredited)
- Ariadne Pennington
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Featured reviews
Elvis portrays a dummy of sorts - he plays it very naturally and he's quite funny! It's not so much that he's dumb, but he's so guileless, literal, and helpful, he seems that way.
With these attributes, he continually gets the best of the bad guys, including a mobster, Simon Oakland, Joanna Moore, from child welfare, and assorted others.
The conceit makes for some hilarious scenes. In one, the mobster, after Elvis beats up his thugs, decides to blow up Elvis' family home. They prepare a bomb and put it in a box. When Elvis sees it, he thinks the mobsters have forgotten their package and dutifully returns it. BAM.
One poster mentioned that Elvis doesn't try to look as if he's singing. Apparently, he was notorious for not bothering much with lipsynching, though I'm not sure why. For my money, the only really good song in this film is the title one. And lipsynching or not, Presley looks great.
I guess we can spend time lamenting the fact that Elvis didn't make better films or get the acting opportunities he deserved, or we can enjoy what we have. And Follow That Dream is better than most.
You can read the plot from the other reviews, but it is essentially about homesteaders coming to Florida with a composite "family" and trying to make their way.
This is Elvis at his best--as he was meant to be in movies--singing and romancing his way through, with a back woods innocence that Max Baer would later use as Jethro Bodine on "The Beverly Hillbillies".
Enjoy this film. It is a delight!
Of course the film is greatly helped by the title tune which in my opinion is one of his best movie songs. Follow That Dream rightly belonged among Elvis's golden hits.
With an innocence here that rivals even Stan Laurel or Harry Langdon, Elvis manages to defeat some pretty sharp characters. The film itself has a charming innocence about it that makes it thorough going fun.
Did you know
- TriviaThe courtroom scene was filmed in the Citrus County Courthouse in nearby Inverness, Florida. When the courthouse was restored and made into the Old Courthouse Heritage Museum during the 1990s, photographs of the courtroom were scarce, since courtroom photography was not allowed there for many years. With permission from MGM, still photographs of the film were used as reference to recreate the look of the courtroom. As of 2009, the only known visual record of the original courtroom interior is that which is in Le Shérif de ces dames (1962).
- GoofsThe kids are seen trying to knock coconuts out of the palm trees and later you see several coconuts lying on the ground. The problem is that the trees are not coconut palms, but sable palms which have no coconuts.
- Quotes
Nick: Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five...
Toby Kwimper: You do the multiplication tables too, Nick?
Nick: [Nick rolls his eyes at Toby] Three, two, one.
[Nick's trailer explodes]
Toby Kwimper: Well, I'll be doggone. Your place done blowed up, Nick. It's on fire too.
- Alternate versionsThe post-1996 VHS prints feature the 1994 United Artists logo.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Elvis in the Movies (1990)
- How long is Follow That Dream?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Runtime1 hour 49 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 2.35 : 1