Review of Let the Good Times Roll

This is a great movie for those who grew up in the 1950's. I didn't. I wasn't born until 1962, but when I was a young tyke, I had to see this movie from the moment I saw the TV spot advertising it on television. Dad and I went out to the newest theater in Austin-- the four-plex was the newest and biggest theater in the Austin area, with an name to mystify those reading the ads ~~~~The Aquarius 4, it was called. The movie was loaded with all kinds of footage from the 1950's, and included in this footage was some ancient looking film clips of the students in High School in Hicksville, NY. These students were demonstrating good and bad dress codes. On the left of the teacher were the ones dressed poorly with t-shirts, 'dungarees', open toed shoes, etc. And on the right, a group of kids that would make today's 90210 crowd look like the Peanut Gallery. In addition to this footage, there was other footage showing the fads of the day, the cars, Chuck Berry's tour bus sitting in a junk yard, and all kinds of things that I had never seen at the age of 11 or so. It was a collage of old films and reminders of an era past that people were trying to remember by the early 1970's. The makers of this film used a technique where they had one inmage on one side of the screen and another image on the other side. So, while the footage would roll on the right, you would see a modern-day Chuck Berry singing in concert. The film was half concert and half archival footage. It was a great film. The Shirelles were in the show live as was Little Richard, Fats Domino, Bill Haley, and Chuck Berry. The 5 Satins did a set too and let us not forget that 'guitar playing fool', Bo Diddley. Bo was there with his rectangular guitar, a pimp's hat with a feather and his uniquie timekeeping abilities. It was a memorable show. For some reason the makers of this film never released this again. It isn't on video, I have never seen it on television that I know of and all attempts at finding it on my favorite film guage (16mm) are futile. The only thing that I have been able to locate is a tv spot from the movie and this is valuable to me for the reasons above. I recommend this movie highly and I will never forget my experience with having seen this movie.