With Fun in Acapulco, we are solidly in the “These movies are hits, no one gives a shit, let’s just knock them out” phase of the movie years. This is the second of two Elvis movies released in 1963. From here until 1969, Elvis will shoot and release three movies a year. I’m not hopeful that there’s another King Creole or Follow That Dream waiting up ahead.

What I knew before I watched Fun In Acapulco:

      1. It has a great soundtrack. “Bossa Nova Baby,”* “Marguerita,” “I Think I’m Gonna Like It Here,” “Vino, Dinero Y Amor,” “Guadalajara,” and even “(There's) No Room To Rhumba In A Sports Car” are all super catchy and fun songs. And even the weak title track is better than a lot of the songs in other Elvis movies.

     2. It’s based in Mexico.**

     3. Elvis movies are often not, um, culturally sensitive.

As to points 2 and 3,  Fun In Acapulco is actually far less cringe inducing than I expected. I was worried that Elvis was going to be half Mexican*** or that every Mexican was going to be a horrible stereotype.**** Surprisingly, the Mexican cast members are portrayed pretty well, and Elvis manages to make it til the very end of the last song before he ever so briefly dons a sombrero.

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So, this time Elvis plays Mike Windgren, an expat from “North America”***** who works doing something on a boat until he gets fired. It’s ok though, because that night (all together now, you know this, people) he goes to a bar, sings on stage, meets a Hot Dangerous Woman, and gets discovered. 

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Weird twists: 1) Hot Dangerous Woman is a lady bullfighter, Dolores, 2) person discovering him is a little homeless orphan boy,****** Raoul.*******

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Raoul somehow knows the ins and outs of the adult world in Acapulco, and has a cousin in every hotel, club, and restaurant. Raoul get Mike a job at the Hilton as a singer. Mike finagles being a lifeguard too. It’s unclear why, other than to meet the other love interest, Hot Also-Dangerous Margarita. Oh, and to set up his fear of heights and the most unintentionally funny scene in any Elvis movie yet. Mike goes up the high dive, fully clothed, and looks down at the water. The pool switches to a circus ring, and we get a flashback of Mike in his former life, AS A TRAPEZE ARTIST! Yep, Mike was part of the Flying Windgrens, right up until the day he missed the catch and his brother fell to his death.******** At first I was laughing my ass off, but then I was, like, “Hey! Why didn’t you make THAT movie?!”

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Fun In Acapulco is pretty much an episode of Three’s Company from there. Mike invites one woman to his show, she says no. Mike invite the other woman to his show, she says no. Both show up. Mike escapes by climbing out the dressing room window.

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Mike also has a rival in the other lifeguard, Moreno, who happens to be hot for Margarita and also happens to be the “best cliff diver in all of Mexico.” Mike pretty much can’t handle what a macho stud Moreno is, and if you wonder if they end up in a fist fight, well, yeah, of course they do.

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And if at this point you can’t predict that Mike overcomes his fear of heights and cliff dives at the end, well, you’re just not paying attention.

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ETHAN’S NOTE: Part 2 of the “Mike Adopts an Orphan” Elvis movie series (Seriously, did they film this and It Happened at the World’s Fair at the same time and just queue Elvis based on whether it was a Chinese or a Mexican kid in the shot with him... (Considering the amount of green screening there is, they totally could’ve)

It is not as bad as I expected off the title and location. Elvis doesn’t do as bad a butchering of Spanish as I thought, and he’s only called a Gringo three times. Welcome to the white part of Acapulco where only about half the people are Mexican and everyone speaks a strange branch of Spanglish where only about 20% of their words are Spanish (usually just to create confusion or because they’re well known like gracias) This is also the part of Mexico that’s below the Equator because Mike is continually referred to as the “Norte Americano” even though.... never mind. 

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Raoul (don’t know why they chose that spelling) is a marketing genius and basically runs the town despite being an orphan kid that supposedly has no family (but many cousins and “amigos”). We had a discussion about the fact that Raoul cuts the same exact deal with Mike that Col. Tom cut with Elvis (50-50 baby!) and how we’re pretty sure that it was originally supposed to be 25% but Col. Tom found out and said we can’t have Elvis getting any ideas. 

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I think that this movie isn’t terrible, but the last scene where Elvis is carried around the town on the shoulders of English-speaking Mariachi guys before being given a sombrero and a drink is pretty much exactly what white people thought Mexico will be like (or should I say México, even though Raoul the Mexican street kid says it the American way of Mexico? C’mon Raoul you were born and raised in Mexico, and you speak Spanish...)

4.5/10 The Flying Windgren’s would’ve been a better movie.

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P.S. The entire movie happens because a mariachi band annoys Elvis so much that he agrees to buy them drinks to make them go away...

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ACTING: 4 Elvises 

MUSICAL PERFORMANCES: 9 Elvises

BEST SONG: “Bossa Nova Baby” and “I Think I’m Gonna Like It Here”

STUNTS: window climbing, circus flashback with tights and deadly fall, lobby fist fight, stunt double cliff dive.

CRINGE FACTOR: manslaughtering of Spanish, some stereotyped characters.

KISSIN’: Barely any.

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*Sung by Greg “Pacer” Baxter in Little Elvis

**But not shot in Mexico, by Elvis anyway. Elvis was "persona non grata" in Mexico from 1957 until 1971, so all the Mexico footage was shot with doubles and all his scenes were shot in recreated sets in Hollywood.

***See Flaming Star

****See Girls! Girls! Girls! 

***** Seriously, everyone in the movie says Mike is from North America. And each time Ethan screamed “Mexico is part of North America!”

******Again with the child costar. Why?

*******Elvis pronounces it like Paul with an R.  “Rahl”

********This is the first Elvis movie where his character’s parents are both alive!