A mouth-watering, sensational Blu-ray box set from Imprint called Youth Gone Wild is now ready to assault your senses with 1950s movies about teenagers gone berserk.
According to author Alan Betrock in his Guide to the Teen Exploitation Film, “What exactly is a teen exploitation movie? That’s a difficult question to answer in words. It’s like asking what is a rock n’ roll record, or what is soul music.” He goes on to point out that “while 1956 had seen perhaps a total of 10 features geared primarily to teenagers, 1957’s total was almost 40.” Serious studio films like The Blackboard Jungle and Rebel Without a Cause struck a nerve with audiences about the restless, angry teenager which opened the floodgates for exploitation films marketed to a young audience. Kids flocked to Drive-Ins to watch movies about reckless teens in hot rods, dancing wildly to rock and roll, behaving badly. The films got sleazier and more fun as they got to the 1960s, but these four represent the hilarious best of the genre of “Youth Gone Wild” films of the 1950s. “They dared everything,” screamed a teen delinquent trailer, “because they cared about nothing- except the thrill of the moment!”
Live Fast, Die Young (1958) According to the lurid trailer, this film was about, “Teenage tramps on a one-way street to hell. Without conscience, without morals they’re today’s Beat Generation, and their only code is to Live Fast, Die Young!” Mary Murphy (The Wild One) plays Kim, who works at a diner in “Mayville” supporting a drunken, persistently out-of-work, dad and a wayward younger sister Jill (Norma Eberhardt). When Jill takes off in the middle of the night, Kim goes hitchhiking after her. But bad girl Jill learns quick- how to get a guy drunk at a bar and then fleece him outside. Even stealing his convertible and heading to L.A. where she hooks up with the owner of an antique store (and criminal mastermind)- Sue Hawkins (Peggy Maley), who fences stolen goods. Mary gets accidentally caught up in a wild fight at a diner- caused by a vagrant thief (uncredited Dorothy Provine). She finally tracks down her sister in Los Angeles, but by then Jill is tight with a crook (Mike Connors) and his associate (Troy Donahue), plotting to rob diamonds from a post office at Christmas time. Jill even figures out how to disable the burglar alarm. Kim tries to reason with her sister: “It’s wrong what you’re doing. How you’re living. It’s against the law.” To which Jill snidely remarks, “Nothing’s against anything unless you get caught.” Typically, for these kind of films, the “teens” are played by actors in their late 20s. This was directed by Paul Henreid, who played Victor Laszlo, the resistance fighter who Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman) nobly chose over Rick (Humphrey Bogart) at the end of Casablanca.
Juvenile Jungle (1958) “A girl delinquent…a jet-propelled gang…out for fast kicks!” was the ad for this botched kidnapping plot by a witless gang of troubled (hardly juvenile) kids. Corey Allen, who played the doomed Buzz, who lost his life during a “chickie-run” car race in Rebel Without a Cause, plays Hal, the suit-wearing mastermind of a plan to pretend to kidnap the daughter- Carolyn (Anne Whitfield)- of the owner of a liquor store (Walter Coy) in order to score $40,000 of the check-cashing money there. But everything goes wrong when Hal’s ex-girlfriend Glory (Rebecca Welles) gets jealous and Hal grows a conscience when he falls for Carolyn. It ends in a wild fight between Hal and a switchblade-stabbing Monte (Joe Di Reda) and Carolyn and Glory pulling each other’s hair and smashing vases over each other. (The always fabulous Yvette Vickers shows up at a drunken beach party). I always liked Corey Allen– he was good at playing sleazy creeps on Perry Mason– he was in two episodes- one as a victim, the other a murderer. In fact, most of the cast appeared on Perry Mason. Anne Whitfield in 3 episodes, Rebecca Welles in 5, Walter Coy in 4 and Joe Di Rida in 3. “Terror takes hold when the kids in the juvenile jungle turn into vicious and jealous gun-happy gangsters!” screamed the trailer.
Teen-Age Crime Wave (1955) At the beginning of this wildly entertaining “Baby Bonnie & Bratty Clyde” crime drama, we are given a written warning that: “Over twenty-five percent of the crimes committed in this country are perpetrated by teen-age youths.” Then we get into the plot about a gun-toting, scarred face, thief Mike (Tommy Cook) and his tough-talking girlfriend (in a pixie haircut)- Terry (Mollie McCart). Mike rescues her from being transported to a youth prison and takes poor innocent Jane (Sue England) hostage. They hole up in a rural farmhouse terrorizing an old farmer (James Bell); his frail wife (Kay Riehl) and their soldier/student son Ben (Frank Griffin) on Thanksgiving. Terry even gets fed up with her boyfriend after he shoots a neighbor for no reason. “You’re stupid and you’re yellow and you’re trigger happy!” It all climaxes in a car chase to the Griffith Observatory before ending in bullets and tears. The trailer promises: “Out of the sidewalk jungle the shocking story of teen-age terror today!” And, if that isn’t enough, it’s helmed by Fred F. Sears, the man who directed one of the most inadvertently hilarious monster movies of all time- The Giant Claw.
Young and Wild (1958) Rick (Scott Marlowe), “Bee-Jay” (Tom Gilson) and Allie (folksinger Weston Gavin), are three punks looking for kicks one night. They find a car with the keys in it, hop in and take it for a joyride before stopping to hassle a young couple at a Drive-In diner- Valerie (Carolyn Kearney) and Jerry (Robert Arthur). The three decide to follow the couple, run them off the road and then while Bee-Jay and Allie are beating up Jerry, Rick tries to sexually assault Valerie. That is until a truck pulls up and they all take off. But their night isn’t over- they commit a hit and run on an older woman walking across the street, killing her instantly. Gene Evans (The Steel Helmet) plays Detective Sgt. Fred Janusz, determined to bring these amoral hoods to justice. But, before a police lineup the three bust into Jerry’s home, threatening the parents at knifepoint, warning them to keep their traps shut. Jerry and Valerie lie at the identification, scuttling any later legal recourse. Fearful Valerie will speak up later, they follow her to a remote family cabin in the woods and knock her around before the police arrive for a final showdown. What makes this work is Scott Marlowe as the alpha leader of the gang. Marlowe was a sexy, brooding, method actor who studied with the Actors Studio, and he really feels threatening and dangerous on camera. You don’t doubt for a minute that he could hurt or kill you depending on his mood. I always felt he was an underrated talent- especially after seeing him in A Cold Wind in August as a janitor’s son who has an affair with an older female stripper living in the building (played by the incandescent Lola Albright). He was so terrific in that film and added so much to their sexual dynamic. In this film, he truly is “young and wild,” but deadly too. This was filmed in “Naturama,” whatever the hell that is.
This riotous box set comes with video essays, trailers, audio commentaries by film historians and a 36-page booklet with fascinating essays on these wild films.
Wow! I wanna watch them all! Thanks Dennis!