King of the Road: Five Great Elvis Travel Movies

01.08.10 | 12:07 PM ET

Today would’ve been Elvis Presley’s 75th birthday. The King didn’t record many travel tunes—not a single E.P. track made World Hum’s list of the top 40 travel songs. But during his 14-year detour through Hollywood, Big E cranked out a lot of travel flicks. Place was a key ingredient in the “Elvis movie” formula: Elvis sings a dozen songs, chases skirts and rumbles with baddies, all in a picture postcard locale.

We know what you’re thinking: “Yeah, but Elvis movies are hokey and horrible!” Yes, they are. But they can also be cheesy-good fun. To celebrate The King’s birthday, we curled up on the couch, curled our lips, and went on vacation with Elvis. Here, in chronological order, are five Presley travel flicks that didn’t make us want to open fire on our TV sets.

King Creole (1958)

A Trip Fit for The King: Young Elvis plays Danny Fisher, Bourbon Street bus boy and two-time high school flunk-out. When his talent for singing is uncovered by Maxie Fields, a shady mobster and nightclub kingpin played by Walter Matthau, Danny finds himself drawn deeper and deeper into the violence and dirty dealings of the French Quarter in 1950s New Orleans.

Love Me Tender: Danny’s affections are split between goodie-two-shoes waitress Nellie and hard-living party girl Ronnie, one of Maxie’s prize possessions. If you wanted to get philosophical, you might say the two leading ladies are representative of The King’s own struggle to choose between a clean life and Maxie’s way.

Best Song: It’s gotta be Trouble, the first song Danny sings when Maxie forces him up on stage to humiliate him.

Worst Song: There’s not much to hate about the tunes in this flick—you can’t really go wrong with a NOLA brass band backing up nearly every track—but the sight of Elvis crooning Lover Doll to a five-and-dime full of women as part of an elaborate heist scheme warrants a guffaw or two.

Does Elvis Leave The Building? There’s no way to fake it—“King Creole” was shot on the irreplaceable streets of the French Quarter in New Orleans. Fans of the Crescent City will recognize a neighborhood that seems virtually unchanged in the five decades since the movie was filmed.

Blue Hawaii (1961)

A Trip Fit for The King: Chad Gates (our man Elvis) hoped a dose of military service in Europe might help reconcile him to his pre-assigned life in the family business. But when he returns to Honolulu after two years overseas, he realizes he can’t stomach a respectable career at the pineapple plantation after all. Instead, he gets a job as a tour guide—and promptly gets assigned to a saucy schoolmistress and her flock of teenage charges.

Love Me Tender: The flick has as many romantic interests as Hawaii has islands. But the one we’re all rooting for is feisty local girl Maile (Joan Blackman), who waited around while Chad was overseas and doesn’t plan on letting a pack of malihinis get in her way now.

Best Song: Go ahead, call us sentimental—Chad serenading Maile’s grandmother with I Can’t Help Falling in Love With You wins it every time.

Worst Song: Ito Eats. You know you’re in trouble when a good Mississippi boy suddenly acquires a psuedo-islander accent.

Does Elvis Leave The Building? “Blue Hawaii” was filmed on location on Oahu and Kauai, and features all the tourist standbys—the luau, the hokelau and an endless supply of mai tais.

Fun in Acapulco (1963)

A Trip Fit for The King: Memphis meets Mexico as Mike Windgren (Elvis), a traumatized former trapeze artist, heads south of the border to find work. Now suffering from acrophobia, Mike, with the help of pint-sized pal Raoul (nearly as annoying as the kid in the second Indiana Jones flick), lands a lifeguard/nightclub entertainer job at the Acapulco Hilton (where else?). Will Mike conquer his fear of heights and dive off Acapulco’s famous cliffs of La Quebrada? Of course he will. This cheesy-bad goodness must be seen to be believed.

Love Me Tender: Arguably the most stunning Elvis movie girl of all, Ursula Andress plays Maragrita Dauphine, the hotel’s social director. Mike falls hard. But one thing stands in his way: the dastardly cliff-diver, Moreno.

Best Song: Tie between Bossa Nova Baby (featuring Elvis TCB on the organ and bongos) and Guadalajara, sung by the boy from Tupelo, in Español.

Worst Song: No Room to Rhumba in a Sports Car. This embarrassing tripe makes In the Ghetto look good.

Does Elvis Leave The Building? The Pelvis never set foot in Mexico, filming all his scenes in Hollywood. Fortunately, the camera crew captured some nice ‘60s-era Acapulco footage for the green-screen backdrops.

It Happened at the World’s Fair (1963)

A Trip Fit for The King: Down-on-their-luck crop duster pilots Mike Edwards (Elvis) and Danny (Gary Lockwood) hit the road to find work. Hitching a ride with a Chinese farmer and his little niece Sue-Lin (Vicky Tiu), they wind up at the World’s Fair in Seattle. When the little girl’s uncle leaves on an urgent business errand, Mike takes Sue-Lin to the fair and we’re soon faced with a beyond-silly plot involving child welfare services and a fur smuggling operation.

Love Me Tender: The King falls for lovely Diane Warren (Joan O’Brien), a nurse who dreams of working in the NASA space program.

Best Song: Elvis straps on a guitar and sings One Broken Heart for Sale while strolling through a Seattle mobile home park.

Worst Song: Cotton Candy Land, a syrupy lullaby sung to little Sue-Lin. The question on our minds: “Who is this imposter, and what have you done with the King of Rock-n-Roll?”

Does Elvis Leave The Building? “World’s Fair” was filmed on the MGM lot and on location in Seattle at the 1962 Century 21 Exposition. Elvis rides the monorail and goes to the top of the Space Needle, making for a nice, early ‘60s Seattle travel time capsule.

Viva Las Vegas (1964)

A Trip Fit for The King: When we think of Elvis in Vegas, we prefer to forget about gaudy jumpsuits, barbiturates, bungled lyrics and peanut butter-and-banana bloat. Give us a svelte Presley playing Lucky Jackson, a cool-cat race car driver in town for the Las Vegas Grand Prix. Lucky’s sights are set on first place, but the underhanded Count Elmo Mancini, Italian racing champ, has other ideas. 

Love Me Tender: Hotel swimming instructor Rusty Martin (Ann-Margret) is the object of E’s desire, on screen and off. The King’s brief yet infamous affair with the ‘60s sex kitten generates some genuine celluloid heat, rare for an Elvis flick. Also uncommon for a Presley leading lady: Ann-Margret can actually sing and dance.

Best Song: You can’t beat the classic title track. But “C’mon Everybody” and the playful “The Lady Loves Me” (a duet with Ann-Margret at the Flamingo Hotel pool) are strong runners-up.

Worst Song: Elvis dons a cowboy hat, bangs a bass drum and tames a casino full of Lone Star State rowdies with a cover-your-ears version of The Yellow Rose of Texas/The Eyes of Texas.

Does Elvis Leave The Building? “Viva” was primarily shot in and around Vegas. Lucky and Rusty do some skeet shooting at the Hotel Tropicana, ride mopeds in the shadow of the old Landmark Hotel and take a day trip to Hoover Dam. The Grand Prix cars roar around Mount Charleston and cross the finish line on Fremont Street. If you’re a fan of 1960s-vintage Vegas, it’s hard to top the opening titles.

 

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