Customer Reviews

Gonks Go Beat

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For me this was a trip down memory lane as I was the pianist in the 60s Rock `n Roll group `The Long and the Short'. Line up: Bob McKinlay - lead vocal and rhythm guitar; Les Saint (Stuart) - lead guitar and one time member of Huyton Quarry Men; Alan Grindley, drums; and Gerry Watt piano. Although we all featured in `Gonks go Beat' we have never appeared in the credits unlike 'Lula and the Lovers', Nashville Teens, Grahame Bond Organization etc. This light hearted 'carry on' type film is worth a viewing for those interested in the history of 1960s music.

OK, you remember those "Bikini Beach" movies that were popular in the early '60s? Well think of this as a Bikini Beach movie gone horribly wrong. This is a totally weird 60s rock-n-roll musical send-up of Romeo and Juliet centering on two squabbling islands: Beatland and Ballad Isle. Intergalactic ambassador Wilco Roger is summoned to resolve the differences between the communities, employing the tactic of uniting a Beatland boy and a Ballad Isle girl; if he is unsuccessful he faces exile to Planet Gonk (inhabited by some strange doll-like creatures that apparently were based on a popular toy of the time). Despite the presence of Ginger Baker, Jack Bruce, Graham Bond and Lulu, the music here is nothing special. The music by the Beatlanders is typical of mid 60s rock rave-ups (watch for the lead singer/guitarist for The Long and the Short doing his best "Enzyte Bob" impression during their number "Love is a Funny Thing"!) , while the music favored by Ballad Isle consists of some of the sappiest ballads imaginable (the best way I could describe them would be to imagine the late 50s light pop group The Fleetwoods on Prozac). We're also treated to musical sequences featuring a band playing instrumental rock while driving down a deserted airstrip and a nine drummer prison jam session (neither of which serve much purpose other than padding the movie's run time) and a wacky "battle" sequence between both factions with musical instruments used as weapons. All this leads to the Golden Guitar contest pitting both islands against each other (since the loser's instruments are confiscated for six months this usually ends in a draw). Lulu's song "I'm the Only One" is pleasant but not exactly memorable, and The Nashville Teens' "Poor Boy" comes nowhere close to matching their hit "Tobacco Road". The bargain basement budget is readily apparent in the cheap set designs and the minimal special effects (watch for Wilco Roger ducking into the cloud of smoke as he makes his first entrance). If there was anything resembling a highlight here it would be the opening credits sequence featuring the Gonks grooving among construction paper/contact paper animation (to the song "Choc Ice", sung by Lulu with her voice altered almost to the point where she starts sounding like Cartman); it's pretty much all downhill after that.

Hi,

Do not pay the rip-off prices($69.00) listed on US Amazon. Its the same PAL Reg.2 disc from Britain. Go to Amazon.UK-there is a link at the bottom of this page (United Kingdom) and order it there for about $13.00. (5.98 pounds plus 1.81 pounds for shipping ) All the countries that Amazon has websites in, you can order from those sights and Amazon will ship them to you in the US. I order from the U.K./German/and Japanese sites all the time. You will need to have a multi-region coded DVD player too. Don't let anyone tell you, you need a PAL TV set to watch the discs. The multi-region DVD players convert the picture to play on US televsions.

Amazons US site does sell low cost multi region DVD players. I've picked several up for between $25.00 to $60.00. The $25.00 machine I bought 5 years ago and use it everyday and its still going strong. Look up DVD players on Amazon, and read the customer reviews. Someone will mention if its a multi standard machine and where to find the code to make it multi-standard.

I just can't believe what US Market Place Sellers are charging for the wild "Gonks GO Beat". Again, Its the same exact DVD from Amazon U.K. at 6 times the price.

This mid-60s British pop musical is quite the obscurity, and though the story of strife between neighboring Beat Land and Ballad Isle, and the Romeo and Juliet subplot aren't particularly original, there's a lot to love here amidst the cheap studio sets. Sure, the soft-rock pretty boys of Ballad Isle would get their asses kicked by American Graffiti's John Milner, but the R&B played by the inhabitants of Beat Land (and the bikini-clad dancers they inspire) are top gear. The soundtrack (which is just now being reissued on CD) features some gems by Lulu, Graham Bond, The Nashville Teens and more.

The film's awash with wonderfully off-beat British characters, starting with a Clarence-the-Angel styled flunky named Wilco Roger sent by the Space Congress of the Universe to settle the inter-island dispute. There's an Oz-like "Mr. A&R" who lives in "The Echo Chamber" and explains that he's "... the sole survivor of a race of people who used to be employed throughout the world by business known as recording companies." Ballad Isle features clubs like the Boom Bar, The Diminished Seventh and Diskey A Go Go, and the island's prison sentences it inhabitants to a term of drumming. The latter leads to a fantastic scene of nine drummers playing in unison on full kits! The drums themselves are luscious in their vintage sparkle and faux-finishes.

The opening rave-up with Ginger Baker and Graham Bond is superb, as is the staging of an instrumental played by band members driven in a fleet of mid-60s British top-down sports cars. Elaine and Derek redeem Ballad Isle with the Everly Brothers styled "Broken Pieces," Lulu and the Luvvers groove to "Choc Ice," the Nashville Teens show they had more than "Tobacco Road" up their sleeves, and the climactic musical battle between the two islands pits literal guitar armies against one another. There are some great `65 fashions and vintage instruments (check out Bond's orange-and-black Vox Continental organ), and even the buttoned-down Ballad Isle has policewomen wearing black tights.

Much like the Lawrence Welk show of the late-60s and AIP's Beach Party films, Gonks Go Beat, is a time capsule of an idealized world that was a couple of strides out of step with its own times. The real-life rock musicians cast as inhabitants of Beat land seem quite bemused by the cultural scrubbing, but as anachronistic this was even at the time, it's now itself part of the historical record. Anyone who loves the British Invasion will enjoy this nostalgic bit of fluff. 3-1/2 stars, if allowed fractional ratings. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com]

I'm a sucker for 60's British music, and I had seen the clip of the Graham Bond Organization on youtube. I knew it was going to be goofy, but I didn't expect a boring film with possibly the worst soundtrack of any film ever. The songs by Lulu and the Nashville Teens were lousy, the film is stupid, and the whole experience a total waste of good time. Spoiler alert: this film isn't worth watching.