My Teenage Daughter

One of a whole slew of movies made as the '50's kicked off for the second half, to cash in on/play catch-up with the rapidly emerging youth culture. By the time 'My Teenage Daughter' hit the big screen in the summer of 1956, no self respecting Ted was blathering on about 'jive'. The tidal wave of rock 'n' roll which had swept across the United States, initially with Bill Haley and the Comets, but more importantly, Elvis, was now taking Britain by storm.

Hanging around fashionable bars, Kenneth Haigh tries to act the hipster, but looks like he's in the middle of a dry run for 'Man at the Top'. Introducing respectable teenager Sylvia Syms to his world of black coffee, cigarettes, fast cars and late night parties, she seamlessly transforms from intellectual prude to intellectual rude girl, by-passing the optional acne along the way.

Syms' journalist mother (Anna Neagle) is the perfect candidate for a key role in the launch of a new magazine, aimed at 14 -18 year old readers. The brainchild of super cool, visionary editor, ....Wilfrid Hyde-White.....who no doubt endured numerous sleepless nights and endless days of brainstorming before deciding to call his new creation....'Teenage'.... WOW!

Neagle's affinity with the younger generation receives a severe jolt, several evenings later, when Syms sends shock waves of such magnitude through the family home that structural damage to the building was inevitable, by announcing her intention to attend a party, at.... HALF PAST NINE!

Haigh and Syms soon catch the attention of the boys in blue, hitting the front page of the evening paper, along with the shock of England losing three quick wickets, following a rain delay. Is Syms discovering to her cost, that despite Haigh's swanky car and hip friends, there's a lot less to him than meets the eye?

One dimensional doesn't even come close to capturing the contrived portrayal of Syms' delinquency by numbers fall from grace. Whilst the recurrent trendy song, 'Get With it' by The Ken -Tones owes more to The Andrews Sisters than rock 'n' roll.

Memorable, largely as Sylvia Syms ' screen debut and for offering a youthful fling to Julia Lockwood, Wanda Ventham and Arthur Mullard, seen briefly as a bouncer, all familiar faces on British T. V. from the 1960's and beyond.

The first problem with this film is that Sylvia Simms does not look or act like a 16 year old and Anna Neagle is about 10 years too old for her part.The second is that the fact that the film doesn't really acknowledge that teenagers as a group had arrived.Everything about this film is old fashioned.You think of all the American films coming out at this time with Dean,Presley etc and this film feels like it was made in the thirties.

I am appalled at the sensationalist title of ' Teenage Bad Girl ' and its original British title is so much better. In fact the film is much better than I expected watching it by chance on a television channel. The cast is excellent, and Anna Neagle gives a very good performance indeed worrying about her daughter who has quite simply met and fallen for a wayward young man who is psychologically disturbed. Sylvia Sims and Kenneth Haigh ( the original Jimmy Porter in John Osborne's ' Look Back in Anger ' and should have been chosen for the film role in Tony Richardson's version of the groundbreaking play ) play the lovers and because of a fatal turning of events land in a terrible situation. No spoilers but the frightening scene of this situation reminded me of Pushkin's ' The Queen of Spades. ' And as a the film's soundtrack uses Tchaikovsky's music ( not too well, but not too bad either ) I thought of the Opera of the composer based on the Pushkin story. As for the film as film I am not an admirer of Herbert Wilcox but this was much better than the rest of his work. It gives a portrait of 1950's life and it rings true, except for a few critical scenes towards the end when it becomes preachy. It is much better than most films of the time that dealt with teenagers in trouble and out of their depth in coming to terms with adult judgements and demands. Watch it if you can. It is not the trash that publicity showed it to be and has a cast at its best who give their best. Highly recommended.

In most juvenile delinquent films, the teens usually do something horrible or at least somewhat nasty. For most of this film, they stay out late and dance to the same song ("Get With It") in smokey clubs. And they yell at their Mom that she doesn't understand them. It isn't until near the very end that the Bad Boy (Kenneth Haigh) sets out to get money from an old aunt -- and when he steals it, she drops dead of a heart attack, no less! Talk about tame! There are far too many scenes of Mom Anna Neagle going "what will I do? why doesn't she obey me?". But it's a good-looking film courtesy of cinematographer Mutz Greenbaum (especially the club scenes) and Sylvia Syms shines as the Teenage Bad Girl in question. Also, Haigh is first-rate as the Bad Boy. So it's worth seeing, but don't expect real juvenile delinquents.

Started to watch this and realised the story is the same it just the times change... A good film for its genre at time of making...