Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

Starring: James Dean, Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo, and a small role from Dennis Hopper
Grade: Classic

If there’s one takeaway from this film, it’s don’t let your kids grow up in Los Angeles.

Summary

In Los Angeles, teenage loner Jim Stark (Dean) is arrested for being drunk. At the police station, not only do we see his odd relationship with his parents, but we also see fellow delinquents, Judy (Wood) and Plato (Mineo). Jim even offers his coat to a cold Plato, who refuses. Judy ran away from home after being called a tramp by her father because apparently, she was dressed too slutty. Can you imagine if her father saw the way teenagers dress today? On the other hand, Plato shot and killed some puppies.

Not really sure what to say about that one.

He lives with his single mother though and she doesn’t pay much attention to him either. Anyway, Jim’s parents are fairly wealthy, but they constantly argue and don’t give Jim the attention he clearly needs. They just buy him whatever and pass it off as love and as a result, Jim is struggling emotionally. As they argue in front of Jim and the police officer when they go to pick him up, Jim exclaims “You’re tearing me apart!”. The anguish and confused thoughts and feelings in his voice are evident. Right after, he goes to talk to the police officer in private and tries to punch him. The police officer avoids it and sits him down, letting Jim take out his frustration on his desk. Building up some trust, they discuss Jim’s issues with his parents, his inability to make friends, and his family constantly moving to “solve” their problems. After he starts to calm down, the police officer tells him they can talk anytime. He then lets Jim go home with his family.

The next morning is the first day of school. Jim sees he lives right next to Judy and tries to walk with her. They have minimal conversation, but it doesn’t go anywhere as Judy’s ride comes. It’s a big carpool, with a rougher crowd and her boyfriend Buzz (Corey Allen). Jim takes the hint and drives his own car to school. When he tries to find his first class, Plato spots him. They go to the planetarium, and Jim makes a little joke next to Judy’s crowd to maybe make them laugh, but they get really mad for some reason. Plato befriends Jim and tells him they’re bad people and how you can’t make friends with them. After the class is over, they corner all the exits, so Jim and Plato hang out on this platform right outside to try and avoid them. This is when Buzz slashes a tire on Jim’s car. Jim comes down, and Buzz challenges him to a knife fight, goading him into it by calling him “chicken”. Jim beats Buzz in front of the whole group, so Buzz challenges him to play a game of “chicken” with their cars later that night. Jim accepts and after arguing with his father about being an indecisive pussy, and Judy not getting any love from her father because she’s “too old” for that (she’s 16), they all head out at night with Buzz and his crew to for the infamous game of chicken.

The already dangerous game turns into a disaster. They meet at a seaside cliff with all of Buzz’s friends there, along with Plato and Judy. When Jim and Buzz drive towards the edge of a cliff and dare the other to jump out of their car first, Buzz manages to get caught in his seatbelt and isn’t able to get out of his car in time. He drives off the cliff and kills himself while Jim is able to escape and live. As everyone scrambles in different directions when the cops show up, Jim takes Judy and Plato with him in his car. Now, everyone is wondering what the next step is, and the guilt is eating at Jim. Sadly, he isn’t met with much help from his parents or the cops. Because of this, the three-way friendship between equally troubled youth in Judy and Plato blossom in a very eventful night. It’s them against the world, but things will get worse before they get better.

My Thoughts:

We’ve seen many films about teen angst, but Rebel Without a Cause may trump them all. It’s an all-time classic, with James Dean at his coolest. With the iconic red jacket, the perfect hair, and a cool guy look that can be matched by very few in cinema’s history, James Dean churns in a performance that will be remembered forever. The most unbelievable part about this movie is that Jim can’t make friends, and he isn’t the coolest guy in every school he attends. Dean does a great job at managing to make us believe it though. While still being the symbol for the good-looking movie star us audience members know him to be, he’s still very real as the troubling “outsider” his peers are unsure about. His uncomfortable expressions, quiet and shy demeanor, and inability to convey certain emotions without losing it, make him the perfect loner character we can resonate with. You understand why people avoid him, but you also understand why he’s able to attract an impressionable young man like Plato with his intriguing personality and understated bravado.

Despite this being an iconic film about high school and teens dealing with numerous psychological issues stemming from their environment and parenting problems, I think this needs to be said: This James Dean classic shouldn’t be shown to anyone in high school. Not to sound old, but I don’t think it would be appreciated by someone in that age group, despite it technically being the target audience. The very “1950s” style of the film won’t translate to a young crowd. This is a movie you appreciate when you get a little older. The topics and themes touched on are still relevant and work, but the presentation may not work for a modern audience with no background on this style of the time period. It’s unfortunate but true. I’d love to be proven wrong though because I do consider this to be one of the best films of its time. I would just hate for someone to trash it because they don’t consider the real-world context.

Unfortunately, this is true for a lot of films from the past, but something seemed particularly different from movies coming out of the 50s.

The melodramatic presentation of films from this era can be odd and at times, laughable with the wrong crowd. Watching a lot of films from this time period, I understand how different acting was back then, but I can admit, it can get weird. The whole reason for the initial knife fight is just plain odd. All the kids are at the planetarium and see something about Cancer, and Buzz reaches across Judy to say “I’m a crab” as he pantomimes a claw. This is already not funny. Jim, thinking he can be funny too, yells “Mooooooo” really loud when Taurus is brought up and all the bad kids look at him like he’s the jackass. Apparently, that whole interaction is enough for these assclowns to force him into a knife fight. Basically, these guys are like, “We got to teach that guy a lesson for trying to “Moo” at us!”.

Like what? Are you guys that bored?

Then, there’s the fact that Buzz dies after accidentally driving off a cliff and Judy, his girlfriend, doesn’t shed a tear. In fact, nobody really did. One guy yelled at Jim, who just kind of stood there confused, and everyone else just ran away. I mean, this guy just died in one of the most violent ways possible, and it’s like everyone forgot to react in a normal, human-like way. Jim just plainly stands there and asks Judy if she wants a ride home. What the hell?! This is why modern acting and the performances coming from the last twenty to thirty years will always be inherently better out of context, and you can’t convince me otherwise. I can appreciate things for the time period and consider the acting good for back then, but if you take context out of it completely, it’s not an argument.

Well, I guess I still have some of that “modern high school” in me I warned you about. Thankfully, I still sit on the fine line of cinephile that can appreciate films from any era realistically, but also be a normal person born in the modern era who understands everyone’s perspectives. I’m as objective as one can get from a movie critic standpoint because of this. That’s why I’m being honest with you. It’s what makes Cinema Loco the great website it is!

Because of these weird scenes I mentioned, certain “big” moments come off as a bit cheesy or flat-out bizarre. Well, in hindsight, a lot of scenes from older, iconic movies come off as such. I think that’s why there’s such a disconnect with people in the modern era watching films that predate the 1960s. However, to further my point, Jim somehow manages to get Judy to fall in love with him, timeline-wise within a day, despite the fact that her longtime boyfriend JUST DIED IN A FIERY EXPLOSION! Despite my rating, no one can ignore the pure insanity this film contains (and no one seems to talk about in retrospective reviews I may add).

Film enthusiasts, fans, and critics alike rate Rebel Without a Cause a classic, and it’s hard not to agree. I think it’s not only a great representative of the true star power and ability of James Dean and how he resonated with audiences despite his short time on Earth, but the film as a whole is just an incredibly entertaining look at how so many issues can affect a young person’s psyche whether adults realize it or not. There’s always a reason why kids act the way they do and though it shouldn’t be used as an excuse, you have to understand where some kids are coming from to help and guide them. Some kids just aren’t independent thinkers like Jim. Some are unstable and easily pressured like Plato. These innocent, but troubled teens can find themselves in some truly horrible situations whether it’s because of curiosity, proving themselves, or just plain amusement. You’ve heard the line, “If your friends jump off a bridge, would you do it too?”. Well, they may not do the bridge thing but think about what happens on the smaller scale. For instance, playing chicken sounds like a stupid idea on paper, but peer pressure is very real during this time in our lives. No one wants to be the person in the group that isn’t willing to do something everyone else is. Additionally, these situations can also be used to prove yourself and gain a sense of clout from the ones you admire. If you don’t, you’re “that guy”, and no one wants to be “that guy”.

A lot of these trivial values and teenage topics are explored in this gripping rollercoaster, and it’s very entertaining to watch them play out in a drama like this.

For a film from the 50s, they really think outside the box, giving these teenage characters problems we don’t see a lot. Their relationships with their parents are very strange. Very rarely do we see a son like Jim have an issue with how his father backs down to his mother in the way he does. Seeing Jim give his dad a disgusted look when he saw him with an apron on, cleaning some broken glass, is very telling. He can’t stand the fact his dad doesn’t take charge in his family, continuously backing down to his annoying mother. He doesn’t consider the other side of the situation in that his father may just want a peaceful house. All Jim sees is an unmotivated pansy with a lack of leadership skills and a necessary streak of aggression. This results in Jim acting the exact opposite to emulate what he may want his father to be more like, even challenging his father at times to try and bring this side out of him. The naturally violent Jim even suggests to the cop at the beginning that if his dad hit his mother at least once, maybe she’d calm down a bit. If this doesn’t tell you the power struggle in this house and the emotional problems stemming from it, I don’t know what does.

It shows how Jim isn’t just a hooligan but a kid with problems in need of guidance and someone tough to look up to. Ironically enough, he becomes this for Plato with the way he acts. Jim wants to be “Plato” for his dad, but his dad just isn’t the man he wants him to be and once you come to this realization, you see how deep this screenplay actually is. Judy’s situation is odd too. As I said in the summary, she tries to show affection towards her father, but he refuses because she’s “too old for that”. However, he basically called her a whore for the way she dresses. Well, wouldn’t she be old enough to dress the way she wants if she’s too old to get a kiss from her father? What kind of mental chess game is this dude playing? Is this really how those hard-boiled fathers acted like back then? What a shame! Plato is all kinds of messed up. The fact that he has no problem telling Jim he wishes that Jim were his father should tell you all you need to know about where Plato is at in his family life. We don’t even tackle the home lives of the antagonists, which is for the better.

Trying to unravel these three was already one hell of a task.

Weirdness aside, Rebel Without a Cause still holds up as an absolute classic introspective of teen life, mental instability, and the wrong people thinking they know what’s best for their kids without truly understanding them. It’s one of those generation-defining films, helping mold what Hollywood was about during a time period where everyone was trying to find themselves. When you throw in a prime James Dean, and a powerful and emotional ending, it doesn’t get much better than that.