I Accuse My Parents

This film is one of those "message" films from the 1940s. Produced by PRC, one of the cheapest of the B pifcute studios, this film premise is that parents had better take more of an interest in their children's lives, otherwise your child might find himself involved in uderworld sumggling rings and commit murder.

The title of the picture is poor, for no matter how you view this film, the parents of the lead character have no more to do with his downfall then you or I.

This was one of those cheapie B films made to fill the lower half of a double bill.

Early in their career, songwriters Jay Livingston & Ray Evans wrote the laughable "Are You Happy in Your Work?" (Do you never, ever shirk?). I suppose this makes the movie notable to trivia buffs, but the film and song are not really worth the effort. Thankfully Jay & Ray went on to write much better songs ("Buttons and Bows", "Silver Bells", "Que Sera, Sera", "Mona Lisa", etc.) for much better films.

A wonderful film - if seen through the eyes of Mystery Science Theater. It is devoid of logic. The best scene is where Joe, our hero, on the run, goes into a diner, broke, and sits at the counter with a gun under his jacket. The old man behind the counter goes through a contrived, rambling speech and then offers the boy a free meal. In the process, he comments that he saw the gun and wouldn't Joe like him to take it. Naturally, he gives him work and a place to stay. One of the many unbelievable scenes in this movie. A must see.

The fact that "I Accuse My Parents" is a bad film shouldn't at all be surprising. After all, it's made by one of the cheapest of the so-called 'Poverty Row' studios of the 1940s==where entire scripts NEVER were bought for more than a few hundred dollars! Also, with an exploitation title like this, it sure sounds like a recipe for dreck.

The film begins with a trial. A young man is accused of manslaughter. In an insanely unrealistic moment, the judge asks the accused to come to the front of the room and talk about his life story. At first, it's all about how his childhood sucked because his parents were both self-involved jerks (hence the title), but so many of his actions seem to have little to do with his upbringing and more to do with that he's a total idiot! To earn some extra money, he goes to work as a courier for a mobster--and having absolutely no idea that he's doing anything illegal! Think about it--he gets paid huge amounts of money to do 'odd jobs' at all hours and he isn't suspicious! Anyway, but the end of his long story, the young man once again asserts that it's pretty much his parents' fault--at which point the judge summarily decides on his fate--with no deliberations, no additional testimony...nothing! And then, what follows, is the judge's message to the parents! Uggh...it's really pretty dumb. However, I must admit that despite being pure corn and bad script writing, it was, in an odd way, entertaining...yet still quite bad. For bad movie buffs, this sort of silly sermonizing and bad writing is exactly what they are looking for--and I can't recommend it enough for those who occasionally like a bad film. Dopey but easy to like.

Of all the Mystery Science Theater 3000 Episodes I have seen, and I haven't seen that many, this movie is probably the least terrible of them all. Sure it is slow, boring, outdated, and without any redeeming quality, but at least it has a coherent plot and resembles a professional film. It isn't as bad as some other MST3k stinkers like "Manos: The Hands of Fate," "Mitchell," "Eegah," or "Santa Claus Conquers The Martians." However, if it weren't for Joel and the bots, I don't think I would have made it through the entire movie; which is true for all the MST3k movies.