The evolution of beach movies

Beach movies--that is, movies with teenagers on the beach, having fun, surfing, and falling in love--became a genre in the mid-60s but individual ones existed previously, at least as early as 1959's Gidget, shown in an ad for its San Francisco run in March of '59.

The trickle of such films became a wave in 1963 with the release of a B-movie from American International Pictures (AIP), Beach Party, with Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello. The adults (Bob Cummings and Dorothy Malone) were top-billed, but it was Frankie and Annette who brought the kids in, and who kept the beach movies popular for a few years. Boys with muscles, girls in bikinis, surfboards and beers and disapproving parental figures were all part of the formula.  

Below is an ad from Mason City, Iowa (you didn't have to live near a coastal beach to vicariously enjoy the lifestyle) with the promise or a real beach party complete with Pepsi, limbo dancing, and swimsuits.
  

Meanwhile in Indianapolis, Beach Party was paired up with Erik the Conqueror, an Italian-made adventure from Mario Bava. I don't see the audiences for the two films syncing up, but maybe that's why they were put together, to get more folks into the theater.
 

A year later came the first Frankie and Annette sequel, Bikini Beach. And in my next post, the wave will continue.