The Cool And The Crazy

This movie was made during the 1950’s juvenile delinquency scare, done by a poverty row studio. It’s weird because it makes me feel like this could have been made in the 1930’s, as it’s closest cinematic equivalent is Reefer Madness. The movie deals with a young punk named Ben (Scott Marlowe) who infiltrates a school with the help of a drug dealer and hooks all the young men and women into the evil addiction that is… wait for it… MARIHUANA! Yes, it’s marihuana, that evil seducer of youth, that turns our nice young men into juvenile delinquents and mayor assholes. But when young Jackie (Richard Bakalyan) tell his girl about what Ben is doing, Ben goes insane with paranoia and decides to take out the kids before they squeal.

Yeah, it’s really hard to take this movie seriously. For starters, we have a cast of nobodies who are playing teenagers, even the youngest of them looks like he’s in his late twenties. Then there’s the drug itself: marihuana. Yes, marihuana turns the kids into evil juvenile delinquents, and when they don’t smoke it, they begin to suffer spasms, shakes and insanity. This, of course, is what turns this dull juvenile delinquency film into a real gem: it’s so hilarious, so outdated, that you can’t help but find it incredibly entertaining. And at sixty-something minutes, you could do worse.