Beach Party (1963) was the first of the Beach Party films, aimed at a teen audience. It was directed by William Asher and written by Lou Rusoff. The main actors included Robert Cummings, Dorothy Malone, Frankie Avalon, and Annette Funicello.

There are arguably two surf movie genres. The first type would be the sporting documentary pioneered by Bud Browne (e.g. Hawaiian Holiday) in the 1940s and early 1950s, later popularized by Bruce Brown (e.g. The Endless Summer) in the late 1950s and early 1960s, then later perfected by Greg MacGillivray and Jim Freeman (e.g. Five Summer Stories) in the 1970s and beyond.

The second type would be the campy entertainment feature, also termed "beach party films" or "surfploitation flicks" by true surfers, having little to do with the authentic sport and culture of surfing and representing movies that attempted to cash in on the growing popularity of surfing among youth in the early 1960s, pioneered by the Gidget series. The film was originally intended as a low-budget parody of Elvis Presley's musical movies, but soon spawned into something more, making significantly more money than the studio expected. Six more films in the "Beach Party film" series were produced over the next few years.

Plot

The plot kicks off with an anthropologist, Professor Robert Orwell Sutwell (Robert Cummings) secretly studying the wild mating habits of jobless Southern California teenagers that hang out at the beach and use strange surfing jargon. After he temporarily paralyzes Eric Von Zipper (Harvey Lembeck), the leader of the local outlaw motorcycle gang, who was making unwanted advances on buxom beach bunny Delores (Annette Funicello), Delores develops a crush on the Professor. Of course her surfing boyfriend Frankie (Frankie Avalon), the local Big Kahuna, becomes jealous and begins flirting with Ava, a foreign waitress who is even more buxom than his girlfriend. In the words of Deadhead (Jody McCrea), "She's got everything!" Meanwhile Marianne (Dorothy Malone) is also developing a crush on the Professor. Also, to top it all off, Ava develops a thing for Von Zipper. Will true love triumph?

The film introduced a running gag throughout most of the rest of the series, when Eric Von Zipper (Harvey Lembeck) learns a special nerve touch to the head that puts a person into a frozen trance that he calls "giving someone the finger". Unfortunately for Von Zipper, the only person to whom he seems able to give the finger is himself. The gag is not used in Muscle Beach Party because Von Zipper and his gang did not appear in the film.