Rating: 3/5
Michael Landon does his best “James Dean” impersonation as a troubled teen with a problem with authority. He launches into uncontrolled bouts of violence at school and with friends.
He goes to see a doctor, who sees him as the perfect test subject for a new serum that should unleash his primitive urges. The boy will likely end up in the electric chair anyway, so why not rush it along?
Like many teensploitations, the film speaks to adult fears of juvenile delinquency as the teenager emerged in the mid-20th century. As one New York Times critic wrote in 1957,
The abolition of child labor and the lengthening span of formal education have given us a huge leisure class of the young, with animal energies never absorbed by tasks of production.
This film, however, was the first to turn a teenager into a literal beast/monster.
- Of London?
- Don’t eat any of the raw hamburger in the fridge — that’s all the foreshadowing we can afford right now
- The “Carnival of Souls” Boyfriend
- So, no one has any memory or accumulated experience?
- Here, try this. You’ll kiss god
- Well, that was the needle, the damage done. Why don’t you schedule another appointment with the receptionist?
- Werewolves are just as afraid of you as you are of them
- Uh, sir, I think I saw a werewolf with a Chinese menu in his hand
- Good thing we switched to standard-issue silver bullets