Thunder Alley

Thunder Alley
March 22, 1967
AIP
Drama
DVD
C-

This is more of a drama than Fireball 500, although Annette does get a nice solo.  (Fabian again doesn't sing.)  Much of it is boring, but I was surprised by the relative depth to Annette's character and Diane McBain's, with the two rivals bonding despite their competition over Fabian.  McBain and Fabian have a racy (no pun intended) scene in a motel, racier than Frankie's with Julie Parrish.  They're both topless in bed, although she's got that movie-only thing of the sheet pulled up to her armpits.  There's also a wilder-than-a-beach-party party where one girl dances in her bra and miniskirt while another strips to nothing.  (We see her clothes flying but no actual nudity.)

Fabian is as bland as ever, but Warren Berlinger gets to be a "nice guy" turned wrong, and Jan Murray is pretty good as Annette's money-grubbing but good-hearted father.  However, the guys just aren't as interesting as Annette, who's out of character but still likable, even as she does amateur psychoanalysis, stunt driving, drunk driving, and man-stealing.

Surviving Beach Party crowd members are Ronnie Dayton, Guy Hemric, Luree Nicholson Holmes, Mary Hughes, Salli Sachse, and Rosemary Williams (the English girl in How to Stuff a Wild Bikini).  As in F500, they're not given much to do.

Announcer Sandy Reed was in F500 and would be in Speedway.  Baynes Barron also did F500 and would be in C.H.O.M.P.S.  Maureen Arthur, who plays Babe, would have similar blonde bimbo roles with a humorous side in How to Commit Marriage and The Love God?  I don't think I have any other Michael Bell movies, but he did make two memorable appearances as sleazeballs on Three's Company.

"So I said, if I sing in a movie, how can I be taken seriously as an actor?"