REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE has two major movements happening as it was released. A rebellious time for youth in the 50s and a new type of acting style. Rock and roll was just emerging with the likes of Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, and Bill Haley stirring up teenagers with their hip swinging, toe tapping music. Movies were picking up on teenage alienation and rebellion with films like Richard Brooks BLACKBOARD JUNGLE (1955) based on the Evan Hunter novel. But unruly teenagers were usually depicted in the inner city or poorer parts of town. What makes REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE noteworthy is these unruly kids are from the suburbs. Their parents are affluent, middle-class. As you watch REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE, it becomes clear that the parents are as messed up as their kids.
James Dean became a star with REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE. Dean's style of acting is unlike anything we had seen from actors in the 30s and 40s. Like Marlon Brando and Montgomery Clift, Dean came from the New York Actors Studio that emphasized realism, known as Method acting. Dean's anguish at times is frightening, his face and body contorted in pain. There's a primal authenticity to his acting similar to Brando's Stanley Kowalski in A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (1951) or Clift's Private Prewitt in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY (1953). Dean's acting style is perfect for his role as restless Jim Stark in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE.
Director Nicholas Ray who is credited with the story idea for REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE had an up and down directing career. He had better success early with films like IN A LONELY PLACE (1950) and JOHNNY GUITAR (1954). REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE may be Ray's most well known, successful move. REBEL'S screenplay is by Stewart Stern, adapted by Irving Schulman. REBEL is not shot in a gritty, black and white style you might expect for a teen drama. Ray shoots it in widescreen Cinemascope and in bright Warner Bros Color. It's a much more stylized movie than one would expect about teen angst. Ray even takes a page from Alfred Hitchcock using the L.A. landmark Griffith Observatory as a key location in the film.
We meet our three main teenage protagonists in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE on Easter night at the Los Angeles Juvenile Division. Jim Stark (James Dean) is brought in for "plain drunkenness." Judy (Natalie Wood) ran away from home after a fight with her father (William Hopper). John Crawford aka Plato (Sal Mineo) shot and killed some puppies. Jim and Judy meet with police juvenile officer Ray Fremick (Edward Platt). Jim's parents Frank Stark (Jim Backus), Carol Stark (Ann Doran), and his grandmother Mrs. Stark (Virginia Brissac) arrive to pick Jim up and take him home. Jim doesn't get along with his parents. Judy's mother picks her up and Plato goes home with the family maid (Marietta Canty).
Jim and his family have moved recently to Los Angeles from another town, fleeing some troubled past for Jim. It's Jim's first day at Dawson High School and a new start. It turns out Judy is literally the girl next door to Jim. Jim offers to drive Judy to school but she hangs out with a wild crowd led by her boyfriend Buzz Gunderson (Corey Allen) and his friends Goon (Dennis Hopper), Chick (Nick Adams), Crunch (Frank Mazzola), and Moose (Jack Grinnage). Their first day includes a field trip to the Griffith Park Observatory. Jim misses the bus so he drives to the planetarium. Jim tries to befriend Judy and her friends during the presentation but they only haze him. Only the outcast Plato wants to be friends with Jim. Later, behind the Observatory, Jim again tries to hang out with the group. Instead, Buzz challenges Jim to a knife fight. It's broken up by Dr. Minton (Ian Wolfe) from the Observatory. Buzz challenges Jim to a game of chicken with stolen cars out at Bruce Point that evening. No matter how hard Jim tries to avoid trouble, it follows him. Jim accepts the challenge.
Buzz and Jim meet at the Point. Everyone's there to watch including Judy and Plato. After the stolen cars are inspected, Jim and Buzz race each other toward the bluff in a dangerous game of chicken. Jim leaps safely from his car but Buzz's jacket gets caught on the door handle. Buzz goes over the cliff and dies. Buzz's gang splits the scene. Jim drives Judy and Plato home. Jim tells his parents what has happened. Jim's Dad wants him to lie to the police. Jim goes to the juvenile division looking for Fremick. He passes by Goon, Crunch, and Moose coming out of the police station. They think Jim is going to rat on them about Buzz's accident to the police. Fremick is out of the office. Jim returns home to find Judy waiting for him.
Jim takes Judy to an abandoned mansion near the Griffith Park Observatory. Crunch, Goon, and Moose track down Plato and steal his address book to find Jim's home. They terrorize Jim's parents but still can't locate Jim. Plato grabs a gun from his house and deduces Jim and Judy went to the dilapidated manor. Plato warns Jim that Goon and the others are looking for him. Crunch and his pals stumble across the mansion and see Jim's car. They sneak in. Plato shoots Crunch, wounding him. Scared, Plato flees the mansion, pursued by Jim. Plato breaks into the Griffith Observatory. The police show up. Jim and Judy follow Plato into the observatory to talk him into dropping the gun and giving himself up peacefully. But nothing ever ends peacefully with these angst ridden teenagers.
What's unique about REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE is how dysfunctional the parents are. Yes, Jim Stark, Judy, and Plato all have their issues but much of their teenage problems stem from their equally flawed parents. And these parents are all middle to upper class. Jim's mother Carol domineers over his father Frank, almost bullying him. Frank is no strong role model for Jim. In one scene, Jim finds his emasculated father wearing Carol's apron over his suit, picking up breakfast he spilled on the carpet. He wants to be a buddy to Jim but when Jim asks for his advice, Frank turns meek, afraid that he'll anger his wife with any fatherly advice. It's enough to make a teenager like Jim become a rebel.
Judy has Daddy issues or maybe it's Judy's father has Judy issues. As Judy becomes a young woman, her father begins to lash out at her. He doesn't like her lipstick or the boys she hangs out with. Judy wants to be the apple in her father's eye but when her father calls Judy a "dirty tramp", Judy rebels by going out on Easter night and possibly soliciting for sex. In the opening scene, she appears to be sitting next to several other ladies of the night who have been rounded up. There are hints that Judy's relationship with her father may be incestuous.
At least Jim and Judy have parents. Poor Plato is raised by the family maid. Plato's father has walked out on the family years before. Plato's mother takes trips around the country leaving her son behind. This absence of parental love and guidance has played havoc on Plato. When we first meet him at the juvenile division, he's been arrested for shooting and killing puppies. That's pretty sick. The police still release him to the family maid. But Plato won't be done playing with guns.
I love films that use visual metaphors for the theme or psyche of the characters. REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE has a multitude. The word chicken appears in various forms for instance. Jim Stark goes nuts when he's called a chicken. At times, he feels like one, running away from his past, so when he's accused, he'll fight for his honor. Buzz challenges Jim to a chicken run. They race stolen cars toward the edge of a bluff, playing a game of chicken to see who will blink or flinch or in this case jump out of the car first. Jim probably loses the race as he jumps out first but Buzz's sleeve is caught on the door knob. Buzz goes over the bluff and dies. But Jim still can't shake the chicken label. Buzz's thugs believe Jim is another type of a bird -- a stool pigeon -- when they see him going into the police station. They think Jim has ratted them out (Jim hasn't). When Crunch and Moose and Goon look for Jim at his house, they tie a chicken to his front porch. The real chicken in the Stark family, Jim's father Frank, removes the live chicken with some struggle.
The empty mansion that Jim, Judy, and Plato play around in represents the emptiness each teenager feels in their own family life. Jim aches for a father he can respect, a good role model. Judy yearns for her father's love, not sexual, just paternal. Plato feels deserted by both of his parents, forcing him to become a loner. Jim and Judy briefly play house in the mansion, pretending they're married and living what they believe to be an idealized union. But Goon and the other guys will ruin this idealistic charade when they lay siege to their playhouse.
"You're tearing me apart!" young Jim Stark wails to his parents early in the film. With those words, James Dean grabs you in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE and never lets go. Dean was one of the early Method actors following in the footsteps of Marlon Brando and Montgomery Clift. Dean is like a live wire, often twisting and contorting his face and body in the throes of teen frustration. Watch what Dean does with props in REBEL. Whether it's a milk bottle, a toy monkey, or a peep hole cover, Dean uses props in amazing, realistic ways. Dean would do something unexpected in a scene, not rehearsed, even surprising his co-stars with its realism like when Dean grabs his father played by Jim Backus and throws him onto the chair and then the ground (surprising Backus). Alas, we only got to enjoy James Dean for a short time. Dean appeared in three major films (EAST OF EDEN, REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE, and GIANT) before he died way too young in a car accident at the age of 24. Dean would never see the premieres of REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE or GIANT (1956).
It was thought that Natalie Wood was too clean cut and wholesome to play Judy in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE but Wood gives a good performance as the girl next door gone bad. Wood exudes a sexuality that seems almost forbidden based on her character's age. No wonder her father (William Hopper) gets jealous over her appearance. Wood appeared in some impressive movies early in her career from the young girl who believes in Santa in MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET (1947) to playing John Wayne's kidnapped niece in John Ford's THE SEARCHERS (1956). Wood appears in another youth gang related drama in the classic Robert Wise/Jerome Robbins musical WEST SIDE STORY (1961).
I had never seen Sal Mineo before watching REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE. Mineo plays the doomed John "Plato" Crawford. Plato has no friends and absent parents when he joins the surrogate family of Jim Stark and Judy. Plato is the most conflicted of the three teenagers, driven to killing puppies at the start of the film. REBEL hints that Plato may be gay. The first clue is when he opens his school locker, revealing a single small photo of a Hollywood actor (supposedly Alan Ladd). Plato befriends Jim. Director Ray has Mineo as Plato give many long stares at the boyishly handsome Jim, indicating he has a crush on Jim. Plato's nickname comes from the Greek philosopher who is believed to have been homosexual. James Dean plays his emotions outwardly as Jim Stark but Sal Mineo seethes from within.
James Dean, Natalie Wood, and Sal Mineo are all excellent in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE. Sadly, each of them would die under unfortunate circumstances. As mentioned, Dean would die in a car crash prior to the release of REBEL. He was only 24 years old. Natalie Wood would have a successful career (SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS, THIS PROPERTY IS CONDEMNED). In 1981, while on a pleasure boat off Catalina Island with her husband actor Robert Wagner, Wood would mysteriously fall off the boat and drown. She was 43 years old. Sal Mineo's career spanned beyond REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE with roles in Otto Preminger's EXODUS (1960) and John Ford's CHEYENNE AUTUMN (1964) as well as countless appearances in TV shows and movies. Mineo would be stabbed to death by a drifter in West Hollywood in 1976. Mineo was 37 years old. Three shining movie stars who tragically died before their time.
REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE is peppered with familiar faces that would go on to play iconic roles either on TV or in the movies. Jim Backus as Jim's mousy father Frank would become well known as the millionaire Thurston Howell III shipwrecked on GILLIGAN'S ISLAND (1964-67). Backus also provided the voice for the nearsighted cartoon character MR. MAGOO. James Dean even does a brief imitation of Backus in REBEL. Edward Platt who plays the sympathetic juvenile officer Ray Fremick would go on to fame in GET SMART (1965-70) as Maxwell Smart's boss Chief.
The legacy of REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE lives on especially in the films of John Hughes including THE BREAKFAST CLUB (1985), Howard Deutch's PRETTY IN PINK (1986; written by Hughes), and Deutch's SOME KIND OF WONDERFUL (1987; also written by Hughes). Although lighter in tone, Hughes' stories deal with teenage loneliness and insecurities and absent or maladjusted parents much like REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE did. Judd Nelson's Judd Bender in THE BREAKFAST CLUB is a combination of REBEL'S Jim Stark and Buzz Gunderson. Part vulnerable outsider, part tough guy. James Foley's RECKLESS (1984) is another nod to REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE with cheerleader Daryl Hannah falling for rebellious football player Aidan Quinn (only Quinn sports a black jacket instead of Dean's red jacket).
But REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE'S popularity and fame is all due to the iconic performance by James Dean and his legend and notoriety that grew after his untimely death. Dean is most identified with the restless youth Jim Stark from REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE. We can only imagine what kind of career Dean might have had if he had lived longer. Would he have pushed the envelope like Brando and Clift or would he have settled into more respectable, traditional roles. Because of Dean's death, the door was left open for a young crop of up and coming Method actors to emerge like Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, and Warren Beatty. They picked up the mantle that Dean left behind. Even today, REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE resonates in the eternal struggle between teenagers and parents to understand one another.
