Girl Happy Review

"I've been like this/Since I was just a baby boy/First nurse ever rocked my cradle/Made me jump for joy/Mama, keep your daughter out of sight/I'm in a lovin' mood tonight/I live a life with nothin' but beautiful women/Cuz I'm girl happy/Girl, girl, girl happy/Girl happy, can't you see?"

Thus spake Elvis in the vaguely Beatlesque title tune of this 1965 musical comedy, all about a singer named Rusty and his band who are hired by Big Frank, a shady, cigar-chomping Chicago club owner, to keep tabs on his nubile daughter, while she and her girlfriends are on spring break in Fort Lauderdale. The club owner is played by veteran character actor Harold J. Stone and his comely daughter is played by Shelley Fabares. While they are both fine actors, the idea that the DNA of Big Frank, a sweaty, swarthy, gorilla-like gargoyle of a man, could somehow have produced a lovely flower of womanhood like Ms. Fabares strains credulity, to say the least.

But I digress.

Number six on my Top Ten Elvis Presley Movies, Girl Happy is my favorite Elvis flick from his '60s Hollywood Assembly Line period. It's not in the same league as say, King Creole, nor does it have great songs like Jailhouse Rock, but compared to movies like Live a Little, Love a Little or Harem Scarem, this sucker is Citizen Kane.

And I do have a perverse fondness for many of the songs on the soundtrack. "Do Not Disturb" is a nice little ballad of seduction, sung by the King as he puts the moves on the beautiful Mary Ann Mobley. To quote the character played by Gary Crosby (better known as the author of Bing Crosby: The Hollow Man, and prior to that as Der Bingle's punching bag): "She's got all kinda curves!"

Among the other numbers are such classics as "Wolf Call" ("Flip flop a ky-ay/What a cutie pie I see/Oop-shoop-a-doo-wee/Lips of honey, that's for me..."), the calypso-flavored "Fort Lauderdale Chamber of Commerce" ("Any male in Fort Lauderdale/Who is not pursuing a cute female/Will automatically land in jail/That's the law in Fort Lauderdale..."), and, of course, the immortal dance number "Do the Clam."

The Warner Home Video DVD contains a deleted scene (and song), as well as some great postcards with publicity photos and the one-sheet from the movie. Available separately, or as part of Elvis: The Hollywood Collection.