Wet enough, but somewhat less than wild, this surf-side snooze, which was also called EXCHANGE LIFEGUARDS, takes viewers someplace they probably have never been--into the world of Australian lifeguard team competition.
LA developer Mike McCain (Elliott Gould) dispatches son Bobby (Christopher Atkins) to Australia to close a deal to convert prime beach-front property into a resort, and to go undercover as a lifeguard to scout local opposition to the project. After falling for pretty blond beach club owner and
opposition leader Julie (Rebecca Cross), however, Bobby switches sides. Julie's lifeguard team is in danger of losing its certification and, more importantly, the state funding that goes with it, keeping her beach club afloat and out of the hands of Bobby's father. Though conspicuously lacking
skills as a lifeguard, Bobby comes to their rescue by putting the team on a strict LA-style conditioning program to help them win an upcoming competition that will allow them to keep their certification. He also tries to call off the resort deal with sleazy local developer Al Eastman (Richard
Carter), only to learn that his father has been ousted from his own company by his two-timing wife (Lois Larimore) and her lover, the company second-in-command (Christopher Pate). Mike shows up in Australia to help Bobby thwart Eastman while plotting to retake his company with new
environment-friendly plans for the resort to appease the locals. The ploys are successful, and Julie's team wins the competition. Julie, Bobby, and Mike celebrate their victories during Mike's surprise reunion with his Australian first wife, Bobby's natural mother (Ann Brisk).
Writer-producer Phil Avalon and director Maurice Murphy seem to be looking to capitalize on the inexplicable international success of the syndicated TV series "Baywatch." But even with copious nudity, SUMMER is less a leering beach skin festival than a dippy travelogue, apparently filmed under
perpetually overcast conditions that make Australia look like a good place to avoid when making vacation plans. Repetitious footage of guys in bikini briefs and silly hats pushing rescue boats into the surf is about as exciting or erotic as the competition segments get. Much of the nudity,
meanwhile, is generated by Julie's beach being adjacent to a nude beach, and, to put it kindly, not all Australians look much like either Elle Macpherson or Mel Gibson. There's nothing wrong with seeing ordinary people naked, but if a movie like this can't offer titillation, it can't offer much
else. And SUMMER doesn't, aside from a look at yet another downward plateau in the career of Gould, who, for the record, acquits himself with more professionalism than his role clearly requires, as does Atkins, himself a former up-and-comer who looks a good 10 years beyond his character's age. The
Australian cast is unexceptional in looks and talent. With virtually nothing else to recommend it, WET AND WILD SUMMER is nothing more than a pinched-budget, slow-moving beach bummer. (Extensive nudity, sexual situations.) leave a comment