Rock Around the Clock (1956)

User Rating:

5.7/10   

Director:

Fred F. Sears

Writers:

James B. Gordon (story)
Robert E. Kent (story)

Release Date:

21 March 1956 (USA)

Genre:

Music

Tagline:

The Music.The Dancing. Rock'n'Roll at its Beginning.

Plot:

A frustrated big-band promoter runs in to rock-and-rollers Bill Haley and the Comets at a small-town dance...

Plot Keywords:

Dance | Rock Band | B Movie | Rock Music | Beautiful Woman

Cast

Bill Haley	...	Himself
Rudy Pompilli	...	Himself (Comets saxophonist)
Al Rex	...	Himself (Comets bassist)
Franny Beecher	...	Himself (Comets guitarist)
Johnny Grande	...	Himself (Comets pianist)
Ralph Jones	...	Himself (Comets drummer)
Billy Williamson	...	Himself (Comets steel guitar player)
Tony Williams	...	Himself (with The Platters)
Zola Taylor	...	Herself (with The Platters)
Herb Reed	...	Himself (with The Platters)
David Lynch	...	Himself (with The Platters)
Paul Robi	...	Himself (with The Platters)
Tony Martinez	...	Himself
Freddie Bell	...	Himself
Alan Freed	...	Himself

Runtime:

77 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Norway:A (1956) | Brazil:14 | USA:TV-G | Finland:K-8 | West Germany:12 | Sweden:Btl

Company:

Clover Productions

Trivia:

Filmed in January 1956.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Coming Attractions: The History of the Movie Trailer (2006)

Soundtrack:

Mambo Capri

Silly but a time capsule of the 1950s

Promoter Steve Hollis (Johnny Johnston) is looking for a new act for teenage audiences. He comes upon Bill Haley and the Comets playing in a small town. They drive the teenagers wild and feature a brother/sister team (Earl Barton/Lisa Gaye) who do some incredible dancing to the music. He signs them up and immediately falls in love with Gaye (and vice versa). However the evil Miss Talbot (Alix Talton) loves Hollis herself. He spurns her so she sets out to to make sure that Haley, the Comets, Gaye and Barton can't get a job.

Really silly stuff with lousy dialogue chockful of 50s slang that just sounds ridiculous now. Everybody is so polite and nice to each other--even the "evil" schemes of Talbot are pretty mild. Also Johnston and Gaye fall in love in seconds! It's pretty creepy though--Johnston is easily old enough to be her father! None of this matters though. This shows Bill Hlaey and the Comets and the Platters performing and that alone makes this a valuable time capsule of the 1950s when rock and roll was starting to get popular. The groups ARE lip syncing to their songs (and pretty badly in the case of The Platters) but still... When the Platters sang "Only You" and "The Great pretender" this movie is just magic. The acting is pretty terrible (Bill Haley especially) but the songs are good, the movie is short and the dance routines between Barton and Gaye are really pretty impressive. Hard to believe that this was banned in some cities in the US when it first came out. In other cases some theatre owners told the projectionist to cut the sound when the music numbers came on! Check out the ending which says "The Living End"! Harmless and kind of fun. I give it a 6.