moonspinner55 One may say "The Private Lives of Adam and Eve" should be judged on its own terms, that of a low-budget drive-in entry without any aim other than being a mild amusement; that is to say, it doesn't aspire to be high art--but then, since it isn't amusing, it must be noted that the movie has questionable aspirations, without the proper handling to steer it in the right direction. A small busload of people en route to Reno, Nevada stop off in nearby Paradise, where the driver picks up a teenage hot-rodder and two married couples on the rocks; after their trip is sidelined by a storm, the passengers take refuge in a church, where one of the frightened couples share the same dream about the Garden of Eden. Co-directed by Albert Zugsmith and Mickey Rooney (who also stars), the film is a shambles on even the most basic cinematic level. In the crude but watchable black-and-white framing story, we at least have Cecil Kellaway as the Christian bus driver who suggests the group sings "Rock of Ages" when the flood waters come. This section also has Tuesday Weld as a possible runaway and Paul Anka as the crooning teen (he also sings the title song in the film's kickiest sequence). But the color dream sequence in Eden, with Martin Milner and Mamie Van Doren as Adam and Eve, is amateurish in the extreme, particularly with an excruciatingly hammy Rooney playing the Devil. Still, one can't dismiss the movie as camp quite so easily. There is quite a bit of serious talk early on about God and the Bible, and later Van Doren shouts and cries to the Heavens, asking God to speak to her. It's a mind-boggling venture that wants to be two different things: a quickie flick for sniggering teens and an earnest character portrait in the manner of John Steinbeck's "The Wayward Bus". But you don't have to see it to believe it, because the picture isn't worth seeing. * from ****

lazarillo This is a VERY strange movie, co-directed by cult director Albert Zugsmith and actor Mickey Rooney, that was barely released back in the day and has never appeared on legitimate home video. The "frame" story involves a motley assortment of characters taking a bus trip to Reno, Nevada when they're cut off by a flash flood and have to take refuge in a church. The movie then slips (for no apparent reason) into a long "Wizard of Oz"-type dream sequence where two of the characters, conveniently named "Adam" () and "Eve" (Mamie Van Doren), re-live the Garden of Eden adventures of their namesakes, with two other passengers, a loud-mouth promoter (Mickey Rooney) and his sultry wife (Fay Spain), becoming, respectively, "Satan" and his consort "Lilith". (Va-va-voom actress/model June Wilkinson also appears as another female minion of Satan).The Garden of Eden story is a lot more goofy than funny, the heights of the (mostly unintentional) hilarity reached when Rooney appears in a snake costume, which kind of looks like a bad papier-mache snake has unsuccessfully tried to swallow a chubby, washed-up child actor. What's particularly strange though is that the Garden of Eden sequence only utilizes four of the eight passengers on the bus. Paul Anka is apparently only there to warble a couple of lame songs. But "the Velvet Fog" himself, Mel Torme, is completely wasted both as an actor and a singer. You wouldn't think you'd really need a sixteen-year-old Tuesday Weld (playing a teen runaway) when you have Van Doren, Spain, and June Wilkinson in the cast, but even in an abortive role, the vixenish Weld manages to out-sexy--and definitely out-act--all of her older, more voluptuous co-stars (SHE should have played Eve). Then there's the elderly but lecherous bus driver who narrates everything (and says at one point of Weld's character, "They used to call her 'bobby socks', but now they call her 'baby sex'").I didn't find this completely un-entertaining just because of the unusual cast and just because it's so damn weird. It's definitely a throw-back to a bye-gone era when the mostly male movie audience was an unapologetic mixture of chauvinists, big-breast fetishists, and dirty old men. Ah, the good old days!

ockid44 I saw this movie as a kid and I cannot remember much about it. But I do remember Mickey Rooney and I thought he was hilarious. I remember Milner playing Adam. I remembered him because he starred in TV series Route 66.The movie caught my attention as a child because I went to church regular and I was very familiar with the Biblical Adam and Eve story.Like I stated, I cannot remember much but I have always wanted to see the movie again. It was corny but fun.I would love to buy a copy of it to see if the movie would be just as funny as it was years ago.

eminges This movie is so wrong on so many levels: Paul Anka opens sitting on his $400 hot rod and steering with his feet, Martin Milner and Mamie Van Doren walk into the closing credits with all their marital problems solved on her announcement that she's pregnant, sanitized by her expressing a desire to eat pickles. In between lies a virtual encyclopedia of every snickering, simpering, leering last-gasp-of-the-fifties nudge-nudge battle-of-the-sexes cliche', somehow made all the worse by strictly G-rated language and less exposed flesh than an Iranian quilting bee.Anyone ever caught expressing the slightest nostalgia for anything about the Fifties except beatniks and early rockers should be strapped down, Prisoner 655321 style, and forced to watch alternating showings of this excrescence and Sex Kittens Go to College.