Exoticalot People are voting emotionally.

SoTrumpBelieve Must See Movie...

Fatma Suarez The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Kimball Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

mark.waltz Fortunately, I never fell prey to taking on the trendy lingo of my late baby boomer generation, but for the fun of it, it's nice to go back and laugh while listening to how the hip generation becomes the broken hip generation and goes from being on the old guy's lawn to being the old guy who yells at the newest hip generation to get off their lawn. This expose of drug rackets surrounding urban high schools has the famous scene utilized in "It Came From Hollywood" where old squares try to explain to urban high school teachers just what to look out for to determine if a student is smoking pot, shooting heroine or sniffing any sort of nose inserting stimulant. Listening in is sexy teacher Jan Sterling who seems to believe that there's no such thing as a totally bad boy or girl, but for these students (some of whom seem rather long in the tooth to be high school students), they are absurdly rebellious. When newcomer Russ Tamblyn arrives at the school, he's instantly demanding control of the hip crowd, and finds himself in over his head when he tries to infiltrate a heroine ring to expose its supposed respectful leaders. John Drew Barrymore and Mamie Van Doren are among the other students, and Van Doren is over the top (both in her acting and in her cleavage) as the loose living and obviously much older than she's supposed to be sex kitten who drunkenly dumps a much older date simply because she can't stand anybody who can't hold their liquor.The future Uncle Fester and former child star (Jackie Coogan) is the so-called respectable townsman who allows Tamblyn to start selling heroine for him, unaware that Tamblyn is really working for the police. This of course is exposed, and results in one of the most hysterical showdowns between Coogan, Tamblyn, the local law and students in a malt shop whom you all of a sudden expect to break out in a song from "Grease". Jerry Lee Lewis provides a few live musical numbers, while Diane Jergens (never heard of her!) gets "special billing" as the alleged female lead. This is a delight to the ear for its campy dialog and should be shown to every generation just to show them how ridiculous their lingo actually sounds in polite conversation. Sterling is sincere in her performance and still quite stunning to look at, while Tamblyn is obviously practicing for his upcoming role as Riff in "West Side Story". For a major studio like MGM to release this (I can't imagine this playing anywhere outside a drive-in) shows how society in the late 1950's was changing. Certainly, Louis B. Mayer never would have allowed his respectable studio to release such teenage garbage like this, especially filmed on the same street sets where the Andy Hardy series and "Meet Me in St. Louis" were once shot. As far as juvenile delinquent films go, this is probably the highest of the rung, although no classic like "Rebel Without a Cause" which took great pains in documenting the emotional struggles of teenagers in its day.

delibebek "High School Confidential" is a tale with a moral, but it doesn't wait until the end to start preaching. The topic of interest is made clear early on, and the effects are as logical as those that were outlined in "Reefer Madness" in the 1930s. But while the older movie seemed designed to inspire drug use, and somehow got remodeled to look like an attempt to sober the youth, "High School Confidential" was designed to show the dangers of dope - hocking the family's prized possessions and engaging in drag races. None of these things could happen to young people who hadn't been smoking marijuana. Teenagers are just too practical when not under the influence.Somehow, the movie tries to get over on the young people by showing what a great feel they have for the current lingo. When Tony first arrives at his new high school, even his English teacher is teaching them about slang, explaining what some of the terms mean, as if this is how slang spreads, through the great American education system. When she steps from the room, one of the students, in his early 30s by the look of him, demonstrates the eloquence of the latest hip chatter by reciting the story of Columbus asking Isabella for financing to prove the world is round. After all, when the English teacher teaches about slang, perhaps the history teacher spreads contemporary misconceptions about history as well. In addition, there is a nice demonstration of the difference between a "normal cigarette" and a hand- rolled joint. That's education in action.In a broader perspective, this story picks up where "On the Road" left off, continuing the story of post-war American youth into the next generation. While Kerouac's crew were among those wild ones slipping under the radar of social consciousness not yet ingrained to the need stronger values to protect their cultural ideals, the HSC crew were just indignantly rebellious in their music, their language, and especially in what they smoked.This movie is no "Blackboard Jungle" just another movie trying to use the new trend of white- sung rock and roll to trample the seeds of iniquity before society has a chance to water them. Looking at the 60s, this movie may have fostered more drug use than it intended to hinder. They make it look fun, after all.

XweAponX Also appearances by Micheal Landon, Charles Chaplin, Jr. and Jackie Cooper.This film begins up with Jerry Lee Lewis and band pounding away in a High School parking lot as Tamblyn drives up in the coolest car ever seen in any of these Teenage Exploitation films.Just like 1955's "Blackboard Jungle", this film depended on exploiting the music and slang of the 50's - Which it did in not so much an over-the-top fashion as films like the '50's rock and roll films like Alan Freed's "Rock Around the Clock", "Don't Rock Around the Clock", or even the anti-marijuana film "Reefer Madness".Like "Reefer Madness", this film tries to discourage teenagers from smoking marijuana, chiefly by trying to prove that smoking marijuana leads directly to using hard drugs, which may, or may not be true- It's an angle law enforcers used to use back in the 30's that "Pot smoking always leads to using hard drugs" - An angle that we now believe as incorrect, in relation to the present day psychiatric belief that such cravings are inherited.However, the depictions of hard drug users, and use! - in this film are as close to reality as I have ever seen, especially in a film made in the 50's.Tamblyn as JD almost does not work, his performance just slides under the door into believability- However, the reason for this reveals itself as the film develops.The female lead Diane Jergens as "Joan Staples" - When Tamblyn's character calls her "Kitten" she looks rather Kittenish. Also, Mamie Van Doren as Tamblyn's aunt "Gwen Dulaine" is a standout. '50s actress Jan Sterling is Tamblyn's home-room teacher and is a good solid character role for her.One highlight of this film is by John Drew Barrymore, who as "J. I.", the ringleader of the "Wheeler-Dealers", gives us a comedic version of Columbus asking Queen Isabella for money - This delivered as a stand-up comedy routine "in front of the High School class" - And he delivers this using all 50's type slang.Overall, the slang use in this film is the best and most realistic of all the 50's rock and roll movies and Jack Arnold, "Creature from the Black Lagoon" and other Sci Fi flicks from the 50's as well as uncredited re-shoots in "This Island Earth" takes a step away from the science fiction genre to direct this classic Teenage Rock and roll/Film-Noire film.

hawparks Believe or not but in this movie I just love to see over and over again the opening credits. And I am sure that everybody that sees this movie, will agree with me. Another outstanding thing is that if you think that rap music was invented and started in the 90's, you must check out this lady from the 50's. Now, the rest of the movie is a very serious drama. A drama that made me laugh throughout the movie like if it was a comedy. Could this be a funny drama? I don't know but if you give it a chance you'll know what I mean. And about the DVD, I was disappointed to read that it was in "full screen", but when I saw it I couldn't be more happy to see that it was a mistake and it was in widescreen as it should (too bad it was mono). And too bad that in those days the credits at the end were so short. It would've been great to see Jerry do the whole "high school confidential" again, or maybe "great balls of fire". I gave it a 10 for the credits, 8 for the rap song and 0 for the rest, My total is 6.