The Green-Eyed Blonde

The title to this film is odd, as it's NOT the story of one girl but of a group of teens who are incarcerated in a juvenile residential home. The title character is played by Susan Oliver....a 'teen' who was 25 at the time the film was released!

The story is an odd one as at first it seems like an exploitation film (the scene with 'Cuckoo' and the window is classic exploitation fodder) and then backs off from this. And, overall, I am not exactly sure what the message really was in this film. In fact, that there is no message...no moral...that does make the film unique...but also unsatisfying as well. An odd little film.

I used to catch this film fairly regularly back in the days when local TV stations ran the Late Show, the Late-Late Show, the Omigosh Are YOU Still Up? Show etc. instead of infomercials (**sigh...**) "Gone With the Wind" it's not, but I found it surprisingly memorable anyway and would like to find it on VHS or DVD someday. a lot of the movies I saw in those days--well, I don't remember having seen them until I see them again on AMC or Turner, or on the bargain-basement video rack at Wal-Mart. for some reason, "The Green-Eyed Blonde" stuck (I can even remember the downbeat theme music!) I've never seen it in any company's video catalog, though... (***SIGH...***)

I guess this 1957 film was a wake up call for many families who were in the midst of either raising teenage children, or more importantly being teenage children, especially if you were of the female persuasion. I realize that teenagers in the 1950's were more likely to incur an unexpected pregnancy compared to children in the past half century are due to the advances in sex education, and acceptance of women being on the pill (without shame) and men purchasing rubbers over the counter as easy as they can buy a package of gum and/or a chocolate bar.

Nonetheless I recognize the need even in today's society for shelters for young ladies to exist not as much to be imprisoned as this film seems to depict but to protect these young ladies who may have had a one night affair that got them into a bit of a jam, or been associated at a very young age with someone who was a bad influence on them.

The acting in this film was superb, and the (then) 25 year old actress Susan Oliver who plays the green-eyed blonde was certainly a mature leader of this wayward ban of unwed mothers and juvenile delinquents with mental problems or criminal pasts. I won't include any spoilers but I must say on a personal note I did find the storyline a bit hard to relate to even though the circumstances these young ladies found themselves in are very real, even in todays standards.

I give the film a respectable 6 out of 10 IMDB rating.

Provocative-for-the-time B-film, with a memorable performance by winsome Susan Oliver as a tough young woman in a woman's prison. This film is more watchable than most B/W B-films of the 1950s, and concludes with a gripping, shocking climax. Watch this on video as a fun escape/indulgence on a rainy Saturday afternoon with a steaming cup of Suisse Mocha...

It was a good movie t'il the end which made basically no sense.