I watched this movie because of my interest in voice actor Paul Frees, who wrote and directed "The Beatniks." He also wrote the lyrics to all the songs in the picture, with music by Eddie Brandt (who had worked with Spike Jones). In the Frees biography, his ex-wife (who stars in it) warns readers NOT to bother watching it because it's AWFUL. She claims that Frees knew nothing about directing, and that the photography and sound were also terrible. And she was right: this movie is a stinker, loaded with clichés about teenage troublemakers and also the entertainment industry of the 50s. It never really getting off the ground, leaving in the "deep Frees."

God, its awful. Yet in such an inept, cheesy, lame sort of way that I always end up laughing hysterically whenever I watch it. Moon is especially hilarious, with his drugged-up weirdness and schizophrenic behavior. Him screaming in that shrill voice: "I killed that fat barkeep!" Makes me laugh every time. The women are both mannish and homely as hell, the 40 yr old 'teen' is just pathetically amusing...and the music being sung IS very femmy and ridiculous, especially when the hood singing it is supposed to be a beatnik. Beatnik my booty...Eddy's just an idiot, who should have ditched his loser friends the moment he was offered a recording contract. The continuity errors are many in this film, including some terrible editing in several scenes and the appearance of the boom shadow on the wall in several others.

If there's anyone out there expecting to see a film about the Fifties counterculture prototypes, skip this one by. Skip it by for that reason and on general principles.The Beatniks is about a gang of punks who bully and rob people for kicks and one of them, Tony Travis is discovered in true Hollywood tradition in a roadside dive by an agent. He's got a decent singing voice and the agent promises to make him the next Elvis.But our lug-nut of a hero instead of saying goodbye Daddy-O in true beatnik fashion, doesn't want to lose the old gang. And the old gang don't want to let him go. Especially Peter Breck, a twisted psycho with some gay leanings who's crushing out on Travis big time.Despite this film where he gives an over the top performance like Jack Palance on amphetamines, Peter Breck was the only one in this no name cast to have anything resembling a career.The Beatniks is a film without a lot going for it. This was one of those drive-in flicks which one could get down to serious business at the drive-in without missing anything of importance.

Filmed for $2.67, this routine, rather predictable film is only good for a few unintentional laughs. Among the least of its many problems is that nothing whatsoever having to do with beatniks ever appears in the movie! The story concerns a group of troublemakers who don masks and rob the same store over and over in order to gain spending money. They then head to the coffee shop run by one of their girlfriend's mother and dance to the tunes on the juke box. One day, Travis is singing along with an instrumental number and is discovered by record producer Delaney who is trapped at the coffee shop with car trouble and is hanging on the pay phone, waiting for help. Instantaneously, Travis zips to the big city where he appears on a TV show, then, after making a huge splash, is set up the next evening to record his first album! Unfortunately, he's dragged along his entourage of Breck, Edwards, Wells and Kadler who proceed to trash his hotel room, coerce him into staying out late and generally wreck his chances at success. More drama unfolds as Travis attempts to rectify his and his gang's wrongdoings and make a go of his potential new life as a singing star. Travis is an attractive young man and ought to have had a slightly better career than he wound up with. His lip-synching to the songs is abominable, though. He obviously has no idea what he's doing. (The vocals he's singing to, though, are surprisingly good!) Kadler plays his girlfriend and is a dead-ringer for Ava Gardner, though lacking Gardner's charisma and talent as a performer. Edwards (who was in his mid-forties at the time of filming!) and Wells don't have a lot to do, but do try to come up with ways to pass the time (check out Wells attempting to recreate, in the mirror, a hairstyle on a magazine cover he's holding!) Delaney is all right at times, but doesn't appear to be well and, in fact, died before the film's release! Playing his secretary and the woman who steals Travis' heart is Terry. She gives a reasonable performance, but has distracting blew eyes. That is to say that one blew one way and one blew another! Careening though the film in a reprehensibly bad performance of hellacious ham is Breck. It's amazing that he ever worked again after this unbelievably rotten piece of indulgent, unappealing "acting". (Amazingly, he went on to craft the highly likable character of Nick on "The Big Valley" a few years after this.) One major supporting role (unbilled) is the boom mike, which looms into view with regularity. It's shabbily directed by voice-over artist Frees and he cast the film with virtually all fellow voice-over performers. It's clear why most of them stayed off-camera through the bulk of their careers! The camera-work is often pitiful with uncomfortable framing and close-ups which almost get the actors' entire faces in the frame. It's got a stale story, a bad script, mediocre acting and uncreative direction. The only thing it's really good for is as a curio to poke fun at, which the MST3K guys did gleefully. Viewers may be quite surprised to find out that Edwards supplied the voice of Thumper in Walt Disney's "Bambi" (not to mention that Wentworth, playing Kadler's mom, was Madam Mim in "The Sword in the Stone".)