Date Released : 1 November 1955
Genre : Crime, Drama
Stars : Tommy Cook, Molly McCart, Sue England, Frank Griffin
Movie Quality : HDrip
Format : MKV
Size : 870 MB
Download Trailer Subtitle
A propaganda film intended to highlight the growing problem of juvenile crime. Jane Koberly, present during a robbery, is falsely convicted of being an accessory. While being taken with her companion, Terry Marsh, to an industrial school on the week of Thanksgiving, Terry's boyfriend springs them both. With the police hot on their tail, they take over a farmhouse and terrorize the family within (the Grants) while waiting for a co-conspirator to arrive with money and transport. While waiting, the boyfriend becomes more psychotic as Terry starts putting the moves on the Grants's son (to make some kind of point), and Mr. Grant takes solace from the Bible.
Watch Teen-Age Crime Wave Trailer :
Review :
Ma and Pa Kettle Meet Killer Teens
The "teenagers" in this crime wave are all at least 25, with Sue England clearly over-age. But it doesn't much matter because the movie never really gels. Tommy Cook strikes the tough- guy poses, but despite the energetic effort can't work up a convincing menace or snarl to go with it. Too bad a Jan Merlin or a Nick Adams didn't have the part. Then too, I wonder what the story is behind Mollie McCart. Her acting is uneven at best, still she does present an interesting screen presence. Her meager credits look like she left acting after a brief fling. Nonetheless, with more seasoning, she might have developed into an actress of note. However, both look like Oscar candidates next to poor Frank Griffin who appears too petrified to register anything but a frozen stare. Rarely have I seen anyone so clearly uncomfortable performing on screen. No wonder he switched from acting to Hollywood make-up man.
1955 was the year teen sub-culture emerged with rock music, James Dean, and Elvis. Drive- in movies were catching on with both youngsters and movie-makers, a niche Roger Corman would exploit to the hilt. Actually, this Columbia release plays like a drive-in special with its emphasis on sex, fast cars, and juvenile delinquency. It's also cheaply produced, the screen time mainly confined to the drab farmhouse. I expect producers recognized this and tried to compensate with the boffo climax at the Griffith Park Observatory. The staging is pretty contrived, but does make for an interesting backdrop to the chase scenes. It looks like the classic Rebel Without a Cause and this movie were made about the same time, and I wonder which had the Observatory idea first since both use it. My guess is that fast-buck artists at Columbia anticipated Rebel's success and sought to ride the coattails. Anyway, the film blends two popular movie topics of the timehome invasion and juvenile criminality. Beyond that, there's little to recommend, except maybe a few laughs. (In passingslight correction in another review: the Fugate-Starkweather murder spree was 1958, three years after this movie.)
No comments:
Post a Comment