Wild Guitar (1962)

  I have no idea where this movie came from.  It was on the server and I couldn't place the name so I started watching it.  Five minutes in, I knew I had not put it on the hard drive.  It didn't seem to come from any of the collections I've bought and it absolutely isn't something my ex would have downloaded.  It's not even a Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode.  I am at a loss.

Bud Eagle (Arch Hall, Jr.) is a young singer-songwriter who moves to Los Angeles to get his big break.  He meets Vicky (Nancy Czar), an aspiring dancer/actress, who gets him a shot on a local television show for new talent.  Bud is a hit and is quickly signed by the unscrupulous Mr. Macauley (Arch Hall, Sr.), who begins to systematically isolate the naïve young man while raking in profits for himself.

This was filmed at probably the same time as Eegah, which did become an MST3K episode, and you can see that some of the props were re-used as well as the cast.  Arch Hall, Jr. is a walking embodiment of nepotism with the kind of permanently petulant expression that makes him ripe for parody.  He might have fared better in television, a teenage Dennis the Menace, maybe, something where you only had to look at him for thirty minutes minus commercials, but apparently he was only interested in a music career.

The problem with Wild Guitar is that it's not even enjoyable B-movie trash.  The plot is paper-thin, the leads aren't attractive, the music is bargain basement and all of that could have been forgiven if it weren't for some really cringy choices, like the created fad of teens wearing eagle feathers as accessories to show support for Bud, even if Macauley himself says they're only turkey feathers.  Then there's the resolution of the story, where Bud uses a tape recorder to get Macauley's confession to payola and cooking his books to cheat his clients and then ....doesn't go to the cops with it, instead using it to blackmail Macauley into being more fair.  So, the message is "we don't want to stop corruption, we just want our share of it."  Classy.

I have since dispatched this film back into the mysterious depths from which it emerged.