The "Beach Party" series taking one of its last gasps: Frankie Avalon and sniggering Dwayne Hickman hit the ski slopes and get stuck doing Tony Curtis & Jack Lemmon routines from "Some Like It Hot", and the comparison isn't favorable. Avalon is actually game, but Hickman has no screen presence and the comic hijinks are mostly juvenile. The script isn't as clever as the ones for the "Beach" flicks, and everyone just seems piqued. Avalon's main squeeze is no longer Annette Funicello, who has an unbilled cameo as a college professor (her two brief scenes are beauties). James Brown and Lesley Gore are both terrific in musical support, Deborah Walley and Yvonne Craig are pretty ski-bunnies, but this fractured gang is obviously a lackluster substitute. A.I.P. continued the following year not with "Cruise Party"--as advertised--but "Ghost In The Invisible Bikini". *1/2 from ****
Review of Ski Party
