Here it is, the goofiest movie of the year, a movie so bad in so many different and endearing ways that I’m damned if I don’t feel genuine affection for it. We all know it’s bad manners to talk during a movie, but every once in a while a film comes along that positively requires the audience to shout helpful suggestions and lewd one-liners at the screen. “Heartbreak Hotel” is such a movie. All it needs to be perfect is a parallel soundtrack.
The film tells the story of an Ohio high school kid (Charlie Schlatter), back in 1972, who has his own rock ‘n’ roll band. But the fuddy-duddys on the high school faculty don’t like rock ‘n’ roll, so they ban the band from the school talent show. Meanwhile, the kid has problems at home. His divorced mother (Tuesday Weld) is an alcoholic who sleeps with a guy who works at the junkyard. She’s also a die-hard Elvis Presley fan. Things are not so great at home for Schlatter and his kid sister, who live upstairs over Mom’s bus