THE GHOST IN THE INVISIBLE BIKINI (1966)
Article 3220 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-12-2010
Posting Date: 6-8-2010
Directed by Don Weis
Featuring Tommy Kirk, Deborah Walley, Aron Kincaid
Country: USA
What it is: Beach Party horror comedy

A deceased con man has a chance to go to heaven if he does a good deed, but his spirit is unable to leave his crypt. He recruits an old circus partner to help make sure that the heirs to his fortune are not bilked out of it by a crooked lawyer. Then beach partiers show up.

A cross between a Beach Party movie and a horror comedy isn’t really a bad idea, and, due to the presence of Boris Karloff, Basil Rathbone and George Barrows in a gorilla suit, I found myself really hoping that this movie would pull itself together. Alas, this was the movie that killed the Beach Party series. The absence of both Frankie and Annette is noticeable, the antics of Harvey Lembeck have an air of desperation, and by the end of the movie it all degenerates into loud, frantic confusion. And you’d think that a Beach Party movie would have at least one scene at a beach, but not so. In a sense, it’s pretty sad; the series really didn’t need to go out with this sickening a thud.