Things to watch after seeing Teen Beach Movie

In a summer where The Lone Ranger was one of Disney's biggest ever failures on the big screen;  The studio had more success on the small screen with the Disney Channel Original Movie - Teen Beach Movie.

The musical tele-movie was not just a hit with viewers, it was something of a critical success - garnering pretty decent reviews.  Its very creative and boasts the best line up of original, catchy tunes -since High School Musical.  Surf Crazy captures the retro feel perfectly;  Cruisin for a bruisin works so well that it will leave you wondering why no one ever came up with the song before.  Most creative of all, is Can't Stop Singing - a song that questions the very notion of a musical.

The story itself follows two contemporary surfer teens, Brady (Ross Lynch - above, middle right) and McKenzie (Maia Mitchell - above,  middle left), who find themselves stuck inside a sixties beach musical; Wet Side Story.  They quickly manage to interfere with the storyline of the movie, namely preventing biker "chick" Lela (Grace Phipps - above right), from getting together with surfer dude Tanner (Garrett Clayton - above left).  Naturally they have to fix all this, before they can return home.

If any of this seems familiar, then it will come as no surprise that the Teen Beach Movie pays homage to several classic movies.  Here are some that are worth a watch.  Some are obvious, some less so and some may just be mere coincidence - but all are well worth a watch.

Pleasantville 

Thematically speaking, Pleasantville is the biggest influence on Teen Beach Movie.  It has essentially the same plot - Two 1990's teenagers (Tobey Maguire and Reece Witherspoon) are sucked into a 1950's small town America sitcom.  

Their presence in the town causes something of a sexual revolution - on screen this causes the tv shows monochrome palate to slowly turn to colour.  In Teen Beach Movie, Brady and Mckenzie bring modern ideals of sexual equality to the 1960s.

Back to the Future

It would be difficult for any movie that involves time travel, not to be influenced by the greatest time travel movie of them all.  There is a clear plot similarity - namely that in both movies our heroes prevent couples from falling in love, and then have to work hard to bring them together.  

There is a moment where a towel starts to disappear - similar to the way Marty starts to vanish in BTTF.  Though there is a neat Angry Birds joke, one of the few missed opportunities of Teen Beach Movie is that no contemporary popular culture is brought back to the sixties - the way Marty did in the fifties.

Grease

Grease seems to have been a huge influence on the movie.  This is most clearly seen in the song like me, which is performed in a similar "girls vs boys" fashion to Summer Loving in Grease.   Also, you may note that the girls location is set during a pyjama party - very reminiscent of the Sandra Dee scene in Grease.

Romeo + Juliet/West Side Story

The movie within a movie Wet Side Story is naturally a homage to West Side Story, itself based on Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.  The 1996 movie version with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes is practically perfect.

Madmen 

This may seam a stretch, but there are some similarities between the movie and Madmen when it comes to examining the less palatable side of society in the 1960s.  Unlike the TV series, Teen Beach Movie studiously avoids matters of race, but promoting female empowerment and equality is at the heart of the movie.

Batman 

The cheesy sixties surf scenes are very reminiscent of Batman on a surfboard.