Wild Seed

Had this little film been made five or ten years earlier, it might have achieved minor classic status. Unfortunately, it allows us an image of a 1950s style rebel that showed up on screens in 1965, a year after the Beatle invasion and the hippie movement had begun. Bad timing! But not a bad movie, by any means. Celia Kaye, who was briefly hyped for stardom, plays a runaway girl searching for her biological father. On the road, she meets a Jack Kerouac/James Dean drifter, in a black leather jacket of course, played by Michael Parks, who was then being hyped as the new James Dean - unfortunately, Dean style acting had gone out of fashion a few years earlier. Too bad for Parks, because he really had a nice quality to his performances, if something about him seemed to belong to an earlier decade. He had his last big shot at potential stardom four years later playing a biker in Then Came Bronson, sort of TV's watered down answer to Easy Rider, but when it didn't click in the ratings, his career never recovered. Hollywood was looking for a new kind of late sixties/early seventies star; Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, etc. Anyway, back to Wild Seed: the relationship of the two leads, as they experience anecdotal misadventures, is truly touching and quite compelling, as you wait to see if friendship will bloom into romance. One of those films that almost never plays anywhere anymore, not even on Turner Movie Classics. Worth rediscovering, certainly!

This was a better movie than I was expecting; Michael Parks is extremely good as the young drifter (I was astonished that this was his first film) - it makes it that much more disappointing that his career didn't take off at all. He's very effective in showing both the protectiveness and vulnerability of the character, and really shines when the camera holds on him for a long time. On the other hand, Celia Kaye's performance didn't really strike me as anything special. There were moments when it struck me as fairly amateurish (in an unintentional way). The film is well directed and the supporting performances were quite good, although this is essentially a 2-person film. It's also VERY beautifully photographed by Conrad Hall; it's no surprise that his career took off after this debut feature, leading to movies like The Professionals and Cool Hand Luke right afterward. He had an excellent eye for the sweeping outdoor locations, and a lovely, delicate touch in the more intimate scenes. The script and dialogue are very moving as well, and completely believable in all situations; the exchanges between the older and younger characters are very well-written. Although not particularly surprising or unusual in setup or plot, it's altogether a very moving and touching story - a strong 7 of 10, close to an 8.

America must have been asleep at the wheel when this movie came out - Michael Parks was one of the best emerging actors of the time - in the footsteps of James Dean and Marlon Brando - just a bit more sane and unlikely to be self-destructive. Yes, back to the movie - the plot was simple, but the character development, the cross-country journey, spoke to the angst of the American youth in post-World War and pre-Atomic Apocolyptic era. Love began to take on new relationships and new meaning, and the USA class-caste system began to breakdown along the lines of the theme of this movie in that very decade. Good luck trying to see this one - can't find it anywhere - it is just a great black-n-white movie that will forever be in color in my mind.

One of my favorite films from the '60's, "Wild Seed" was a touching sensitve view of two lost souls thrown together---a common plot of the times. This however, was in my opinion, one of the best performances by Michael Parks. I recall that the film was completed in about 3 weeks, done on a very low budget, and some of the dialogue was, in fact, ad libbed because of the cost. Parks carries off his role as a drifter with a heart so beautifully. We see that he really wants to reach out to the Celia Kaye character, but is so impacted by his past that he doesn't exactly know how. Eventually, the kindness he seeks from others shines through. I agree that Celia Kaye's acting is the weaker part of the film. She was a newcomer (and what did happen to her?)in this film; but Parks shines as someone aching to connect with someone in a purposeful sensitve way. He does so, sometimes, not with dialogue, but with a look, a shrug, a distanced stare, using the environment as part of his character. His characterization is reminiscent of a low-key James Dean; nuances are Parks' strength. The filming uses the seamier sides if cities as backdrop, yet, with rain-washed streets, there is something hopeful in those scenes. It's must-see for people wanting to see a classic story of the '60's generation and why we wandered and connected with strangers at critical times in our lives.

The great Conrad Hall (the original Outer Limits) photographed Wild Seed in black & white and his mastery of light and shadow fit the noir mood of this melancholy story. The late Michael Parks is excellent and Celia Kaye in an early role perfectly projected the innocence of am earnest young girl inexperience in life. An experienced actress would have come across as artificial and "Hollywood." Their growing love story is completely believable. The direction by Brian Hutton is effective. Much of the story takes place on freight trains which gets a little tedious but the logistics of shooting these sequences had to have been complex and somewhat dangerous. It was produced by Marlon Brando's production company and it would not have been a stretch to see a 50s era Brando take the Parks role but not in 1964. Parks was more Dean than Brando in demeanor and it's hard to understand why Then Came Bronson hasn't been released on DVD when every piece of junk is. Turner Classics made a bad decision to pair this with Parks' and Ann- Margret's Bus Riley's Back In Town for a 2AM showing Nov. 25, 2017 on TCM Underground instead of giving it an 8PM time slot with a guest when more people would have tuned in to appreciate this little-seen gem. These films are all wrong for Underground which focuses on psychotronic, whacked-out films.