Assassin of Youth

Just like many young people, a group of teenage friends enjoy a partying lifestyle, drinking, dancing and smoking weed. However, the devil of the drug starts as a bit of fun but soon they are living the consequences. During a night of partying that leads them to naked frolicking on the beach, one girl drowns while another ends up pregnant from a moment of casual sex. The pregnant girl gives up her baby as unwanted and continues her lifestyle, getting into harder drugs and getting more and more into the world of her dealer.

Unlike many other viewers on this site, I did not deliberately turn to this film to have ironic laughs at it but more out of interest. I had seen clips of this film played in modern documentaries (Grass for example) and easily derided and, in fairness, it is easy to do because they are dated and rather corny but just to watch it with an agenda to mock it is to do the film (and yourself) a disservice. It is easy to forget that this was one of many attempts to control drug use in the 1930's, the Government turned to movies as part of trying to educate the public. Looking at it now of course, the film is pretty extreme in its depiction of the consequences– it does show the vague good side of drugs, the feelings that it gives you etc but it makes the partying out as a bad thing and ignores that the consequences for every user will not be as extreme as this film tries to portray as the norm for even an one-time casual user; like Bill Hicks said 'never robbed nobody, never shot nobody, never lost one single job. Laughed my *ss off, and went about my day' (I'm paraphrasing).

In terms of its value as a film, it is of course pretty weak. The direction is OK but the production values are low even for the period; some shots are really badly lit, the film crackles and jumps around a lot due to frequent dropped frames and the soundtrack cuts in and out quite badly. The acting is also only average; it would be easy to criticise the actors for how quickly they take their characters from clean cut down to junkies but that is not their fault – they were only doing what they were told and I did think that they did do an OK job. Let's not forget that this is not a movie – it is an educational film and even today the production values and acting within educational films is still pretty dire; the last one I was a short film on confined space entry with William Shatner – hardly a piece of art!

Whether or not you agree, I have seen some of this type of film that actually do show the appeal of drugs in a reasonable fashion (The Pace That Kills did OK I felt) but this one is just far too one sided. The nearest it gets to actual thought is to begrudgingly admit that the kids have a good time, but that's it, no other though as to the reasons or the appeal and it obviously ignores the fact that bad things won't always happen. The film is clearly aimed at parents more than children because I can't imagine many teenage boys watching a group of girls get naked and being very open to ideas, who would say 'parties with naked girls? Nope – not for me thank you'! If I had been told that weed brought you into this sort of party then I would have started puffing a lot sooner than I did – all it does for me is make me sleepy, hungry and laugh, with rarely a naked 19 year old girl anywhere to be seen.

It does what it intends to do – scare without anything in the way of actual information and in doing this it damages whatever good it could have done. I'm sure that even in the 1930's people looked at this and saw it as a very one-sided morality piece as opposed to an educational film. Imagine doing one about alcohol and suggesting that even one drink (not intentionally excessive drinking) would lead you to bar fights, unemployment, broken marriages and homelessness! This is not to ignore the fact that drinking can destroy lives (or even nights out) but to pretend that it is not generally OK would damage your case and it is the same here. It comes across as moral hand wringing and, even though its intentions and aims are good it just becomes heavy handed and really poor both as a film and a piece of social education.

Overall, this is not a good film by any stretch of the imagination, but if you only watch it to get ironic laughs while you smoke some puff then you are not giving it a chance or meeting it on its own ground – that of the mid-thirties. The production is average at best – poor lighting, a poor script, simplistic characters and a real biased spin to the story and, by being so blindly one-sided, it damages its value both at the time and now. A cheap, terrible film – but I could have forgiven it that if it had had educational value and had done some good – it didn't.

A mildly laughable anti-marijuana picture, ASSASSIN OF YOUTH has some things going for it. The cast of ASSASSIN OF YOUTH is solidly capable for a roadshow production, and several actors have opportunities to shine in comic roles (in particular, the judge, the old checker-playing codger and the Margaret Hamilton "wicked witch" look-alike). Luana Walters is an appealing heroine, and a talented actress. (Her biography at IMDb suggests that Luana might have been better off with marijuana as her drug of choice.)

Today the old drug-scare films are played for laughs, but ASSASSIN OF YOUTH is an exceptionally competent production. The irony here is that truly terrible dope-soaps like REEFER MADNESS and MARIHUANA are much more entertaining, because they don't waste time with dramatic niceties.

The most notorious anti-drug movies of the 1930s were made by private entrepreneurs like Dwain Esper and Elmer Clifton, not by the U.S. Government. These gentlemen capitalized on the Government's anti-drug publicity, but they were not bound by any political agenda of the day. Their aim was to supply the public what the Hollywood studios could not provide under the Production Code - flashes of T&A, and graphic depictions of vice.

Blonde bombshell, Fay McKenzie, steals the picture from the others as the evil, conniving, immoral Jezebel who heads a marijuana ring. Fay is a really delightful minx who doesn't try to gain any sympathy as she leads brainless bimbo, Luana Walters, down the paths of unrighteousness. Everyone seems to pick on poor Luana. She's the heiress to a small fortune, only, if she comports herself in a clean and moral way. Then there's another sub-story of a reporter who infiltrates this drug crazed group of swingers and wouldn't you know it, but he also gets Luana into deep trouble. The great fun of watching these long forgotten roadshow movies--where the movie owners would rent a theater in towns to show them--is wondering whatever happened to the cast and crew. This movie has some good location and indoor shooting. You watch the young performers doing the latest hot dance step which consists of much hip shaking and head jerking. Whatever happened to Fay McKenzie? She had an honest sparkle of talent and looked great in her l936 fashions. I'm adding this little gem to my permanent DVD library.

This is a bad movie that purports to be an educational film designed to warn America about the menace of marijuana use. However, like almost all the so-called "educational" films of the 30s and 40s, it was really a shabby little film designed to be snuck past the censors of the Hays Office. In 1934, the major studios all agreed to abide by the dictates of a stronger Production Code--eliminating sex, nudity, cursing and "inappropriate" plots in films (these had actually been relatively common in films in the early 30s). However, in an effort to sneak in smut, small studios created films to shock adults when they learn about terrible social ills, though they were REALLY intended to titillate and slip adult themes past the censors! Such films as CHILD BRIDE, MAD YOUTH, REEFER MADNESS and SEX MADNESS were all schlocky trash that skirted past the boards because they were supposedly educational. Even though they were laughably bad, they also made money due to low production costs and because they offered nudity, violence and sordid story lines--all in the name of education!

ASSASSIN OF YOUTH is a bit more watchable and entertaining than the average grade-z expoitational film. While it DOES feature a brief glimpse of nudity and plenty of over-the-top scenes, it also occasionally actually has some decent acting (I love the old man who owns the soda fountain--he's great) and writing that make it rise slightly above the rest of the films of the genre--particularly towards the end.

It's the story of two sisters--one is wild and the other just really stupid. The really stupid one is the heir to her grandmother's will and she stands to inherit a lot of money--provided she stays out of trouble and is a "nice girl". If not, then the local drug-dealing skank (her cousin) will inherit it because no one knows that this blonde floozy is evil. So it's up to this rotten cousin to do everything she can to destroy the stupid lady's reputation. First, when the stupid lady falls in the lake (thus allowing the audience a cheap thrill when she flashes her boobs), the bad cousin pushes the stupid girl's clothes into the fire (where the had been drying). As a result, she had to go home in only a coat. Second, on two separate occasions, the cousin slips her drugs and makes everyone in town think she's an addicted slut. However, when a nice reporter gets involved, he is able to rush in and save the day at the end--convincing everyone that the lady is only a dim-wit, not a slut or drug user!!

So let's talk about the bad--because after all, that's why people today would approach this film--wanting to see and laugh at the bad. There is a very prudish character who at first glimpse looks a lot like Margaret Hamilton from THE WIZARD OF OZ. Again and again, they show the exact scene of this old biddy on her motor scooter and it's super-reminiscent of the scene of Hamilton riding her bike (all that was missing was the ominous music). Her silly performance and the frequent use of this footage became comical. Second, the dialog in this film by the dumb girl is among the funniest in film history. Here is just one example:

Dumb Girl taking a sip of a spiked drink--"Gee this tastes funny". Sleazy Guy--"Don't worry--just drink it". Dumb Girl--"Okay". (as she sucks down a mickey).

With dialog like that, is it very surprising that again and again this idiot gets in trouble and nearly loses her inheritance?

Now understand that the Dumb Girl doesn't get all the rotten dialog--there's plenty for others as well. Such as when the doctor is called because the Dumb Girl's sister is "in a bad way" after using pot. When her mother asks the doctor how the girl is, he declares "she's a hopeless psychopath"--all because of the evils of marijuana!!

Sadly, there might have been a good reason to make such a film--after all, drugs do make people really stupid and ruin a lot of lives. But this film is so anti-marijuana that is tells us that it is much worse than heroin or pills. This over-statement might have potentially encouraged kids to avoid the dreaded pot and stick with "safer" drugs, like morphine, heroin or god knows what!! My assumption, though, is that most pot-heads just watched the film for a good laugh.

Assassin of Youth (1937)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Another "warning" picture tells us the horrors of marijuana. In the film various teens are losing their minds, killing others or killing themselves all because they take a hit of the evil weed. Soon a reporter goes undercover as a soda jerk to try and get to the bottom of this evil drug that is causing people to lose their minds with a single puff. Obviously this film falls into the same category as REEFER MADNESS but this here doesn't come close to the "class" of that picture. It's weird reviewing these movies because more often than not the worse they are the more entertaining they are. ASSASSIN OF YOUTH is certainly better "made" than REEFER MADNESS but sadly it's a tad bit too straight and never goes so over-the-top to the point where you can actually laugh at it. There's nothing here so crazy that you'll be rolling on the floor laughing so sadly the entertainment value isn't quite as high (no pun intended) as you'd hope for. With that said, if you're a fan of these types of movies then you'll certainly want to check it out as we're treated with all sorts of really bad information on weed and how one little puff can make you want to blow your head off or even worse....make you want to get naked. Yes, there's a sequence here where pot makes you want to go nude. God knows no one wanted to be naked before pot came along. The performances are pretty much what you'd expect from a picture like this but, then again, they are slightly better than you normally see. ASSASSIN OF YOUTH is going to appeal to a limited number of people but if you're throwing a party and looking for the laughs then REEFER MADNESS is still the way to go.