Things That Make You Go Hmmm ....

The other day I mentioned that I had just watched the Elvis film "Fun In Acapulco," which also starred Bond-Girl Bombshell Ursula Andress.  (I decided that I would watch ALL of Elvis' movies again to re-observe them with the benefit of 60 year 20/20 hindsight)

I know what you're thinking ...

Why would ANYONE punish themselves in that way???  Could there be any worse torture than to watch ALL 31 of Elvis' films?!?! 

It's just something I decided to do ... 

I've owned them all for years ... but there were a good number of them (the vast majority, in fact) that I had never seen ... and this PARTICULAR film piqued my interest when I learned recently that Elvis filmed all of HIS scenes after the bulk of the background scenes had already been filmed in Mexico using an "Elvis stand-in!"

(Things that make you go ... hmmm ...)

"Fun In Acapulco" was Elvis' 13th theatrically released film.  The timing couldn't have been more atrocious ...  

It opened in movie theaters the weekend after President Kennedy had been assassinated.  A few short weeks later, Beatlemania would hit The United States in a way we hadn't been affected by music since, well, Elvis came along in 1956!  (The Beatles, in fact, would see "Fun In Acapulco" at a drive-in movie theater in Miami when they were there to film their second appearance on "The Ed Sullivan Show!")  

There couldn't have been a worse example showing how far Elvis' career and appeal had fallen ... here was "The King Of Rock And Roll" singing a bunch of lame songs backed by a couple of Mexican Mariachi Bands while The Beatles were generating screams and mass excitement in ways we'd never seen before.  The British Invasion was about to hit our shores and turn the music world on its ear.  (In all fairness, Elvis DID manage one hit record off the soundtrack ... "Bossa Nova Baby" made The Top Ten in all three trades before the movie even hit theaters.)

 

[The "Viva Mix" released in 2014 blows this original version away!  The idea was to make Elvis sound "contemporary" by remixing some of his best-known hits ... guess this one snuck in somehow, too ... but it's really a pretty cool version!]

 

As for the film itself, it's not one of his better efforts.  (In fact, his pint-sized costar Larry Domasin steals the show as Elvis' self-appointed manager.)  There's a great scene where his character Raoul pits two nightclub owners against each other to jack up Elvis' performance rate to about fifteen times what he was previously making, only to tell him that now that he secured him this big raise, his management share is 50%.  I'll betcha that even Colonel Tom Parker had to smile at that line!!! (And perhaps feel a bit inspired to aim a little higher!)

Elvis plays Mike Windgren, a former circus performer, traumatized by an accident that killed his trapeze partner.  He takes a job as a lifeguard at one of the hotels down in Mexico but shows a genuine fear of heights as a result of the guilt he's been carrying around since the accident.  (Although you'll see him dressed as a matador in some of the promotional shots, Elvis is actually romancing a FEMALE bull fighter, played by Elsa Cardenas ... we never actually get to see her in the bullfighters ring either ... but she spends most of the film competing for Elvis' attention with hotel social director Ursula Andress who, by all accounts, was in hot pursuit of Elvis the entire time they were filming in REAL life as well.)  Andress was in high profile after her role in the James Bond film, "Dr. No" ... but was already married to John Derek, who spent quite a bit of time on-set, keeping an eye on the hot couple.  Elvis' character ultimately overcomes his fears by making a death-defying dive off the mountains, winning both his confidence back ... and the girl.  (They get married at the end of the film.)

"Fun In Acapulco" reached #1 at the box office, grossing just over $3 million ... it was the highest grossing musical film of the year. 

So why did Elvis film HIS parts of the movie in Los Angeles while the rest of the cast and crew were south of the border filming the bulk of the movie?  And how did his "imposed" scenes look in the final cut of the film?

Well, it seems that Elvis had been declared "persona non grata" (as in "not welcome in Mexico") after two of his previous films ("King Creole" and "G.I. Blues") had caused riots at the Las Americas cinema in Mexico City.  They felt he projected a bad image for impressionable Mexican teenagers.

But there was a little more to it than that ...

According to Wikipedia, the ban actually started in 1957 when "Excelsior," Mexico's foremost newspaper, published an article by gossip columnist Federico de Leon that stated Presley had been interviewed while visiting Tijuana and allegedly said the he would "not care to go sing in Mexico, as he found it a distasteful country" and that he would prefer to kiss three African American women than a single Mexican woman.  (YIKES!!!)

That's some pretty damaging stuff ... 

Except he never said it ... 

In fact, he had never even been to Tijuana or done an interview with the Mexican press at all ... but the perceived snub caused Mexican teenagers to become physically violent during the showing of his films.  (100 people were jailed during the riots caused by "King Creole" alone!)  Soon, Presley's records were banned from radio airplay and publicly burnt in the El Zocalo Town Square.  His records were also banned from being sold in record shops.  (Knowing all of this, WHY on earth would Elvis agree to make a movie portraying Mexico and Acapulco in any kind of positive light at all???  If anything, his association with the city was a 50/50 proposition at best ... it would either spur travel and resort business ... or stop it all together!!!)

Decades later, it came to light that those false Presley quotes were the work of Ernesto Peralta Uruchurtu, a power politician, and the Regent of Mexico City.  Uruchurtu reportedly sent a blank check to Elvis' Los Angeles offices in early 1957 in return for Presley's appearance at the 15th birthday bash of the daughter of a powerful media mogul.  When proper terms could not be agreed upon between the parties concerned, the check was returned.  However, by this point, the mogul had already begun to boast publicly that Elvis would be appearing at his daughter's birthday party.  When it became clear that that was no longer going to happen, the story of Elvis' rebuff was planted in "Excelsior" and used as an excuse in order to explain why didn't come.  It was their own private revenge to attack Elvis' career. (Again ... knowing all of this ... WHY would he want to make a film helping to PROMOTE Mexico at this time in light of these events?!?!  What good will were they expecting to generate???)

As to the look of the film itself, there are a number of scenes that almost look like they were filmed for a Viewmaster ... there is a very definite 3-D look to them where Elvis is fully to the front of the scene and closest to the camera and everything else looks somewhat distant in the background ... but overall, it's really pretty seamless.  Elvis interacts with most of the cast throughout the film ... and there isn't anything obvious to tip viewers off that he was effectively "spliced in" after the fact in the editing process.  If anything, I'd say it has to rank as pretty sophisticated editing for its time.

The reviews weren't especially kind ... most agreed this film was "for Elvis fans only" ... and that the beautiful travelog scenery far outweighed anything Elvis and the others were doing onscreen.  (I'm not the only reviewer to think that Elvis' young costar Larry Domasin steals the show either!)

But the biggest hurdle was the timing of the release of the film.  Pop culture changed literally overnight with the arrival of The Beatles.  The gap between their generational appeal expanded significantly.

Yes, "Viva Las Vegas" was still to come ... but Elvis never really got the spotlight back until his 1968 Comeback Television Special.