High School Big Shot

**SPOILERS** Not at all popular with the girls in high school young Marvin "Marve" Grant, Tom Pittman is at the end of every school bullies fist for showing them up with his vast knowledge and dedication to study that made him a straight A student.

One afternoon the class bully's girl Betty Alexander, Virginia Aldridge, makes a play for Marve. This has her brutish boyfriend Vince Rumbo,almost punch him out. Betty is failing in English and wan't Marve to do her term paper in order for her to pass which Marve does without thinking of what he's getting into. Later at class the English teacher Mr.Carter, Peter Leeds, realizes that the bird-brained Betty couldn't have wrote such an in-dept report of Shakesepare's works and fails her. Mr. Carter also withdraws a recommendation for Marve, who Mr.Carter knows wrote Betty's report, to get a scholarship for college.

Depressed over what happened Marve tries to get back into the good graces of Betty but the only way she would even talk to him is if he can give her jewelry and furs as well as loads of cash which the poor nerd doesn't have.

At home Marve's dad Mr. Grant, Malcolm Atterbury, a widower is down on his luck and in the dumps being a hopeless alcoholic and out of work which doesn't help Marve's already depressing situation a bit. Later in the film Mr. Grant's depression leads him to hang himself.

Working part-time as a shipping clerk Marve overhears his boss. Mr Mathews, Byron Foulger, talk about a big $1,000,000.00 dope deal he's get planned with one of his gangster friends. Marve realizes this is the chance for him to make it big with Betty by giving her all the things that she always dreamed of. As smart as Marve is in school he's a stupid jerk when it comes to girls not realizing that Betty has no interest in him at all and is only using the poor sap for her own selfish gains.

Getting together with a local hood, who doubles as a liquor store owner, Samuel Tallman, Louis Quinn, and his safe cracking brother-in-law Harry March, Stanly Adams, the three plan to rip off Mr. Matthews office safe before he can make the switch and take off with the million dollars. Mave makes a fatal mistake by boasting to Betty later of his plan and the two-timing gold digger gets in touch with the Neanderthal Vince Rumbo to rip off Marve and his fellow crooks after they get Mr. Mathews cash.

Sad ending to a sad story with Betty getting gunned down by an outraged Vince who finally realized what a snake she really is with him getting shot and killed in return in a shootout with the police and the Mathews gang. Marve who had a bright future ends up behind bars with nothing to look forward too but a six by eight foot cell and a social security check when he's finally released from prison in some 30 to 50 years.

It's sad that actor Tom Pittman died on Halloween 1958 in car smash-up on a California highway. Pittman's brief film career included his first movie in 1957 with director's John Frankenheimer's first motion picture "The Young Stranger" and his last cult director Samuell Fuller's very underrated and almost unknown post World War Two Germany classic "Verboten" in 1959 released, like High School Big Shot, the year after Pittman's death.

This movie essentially begins with a high school student named "Marvin 'Marv' Grant" (Tom Pittman) having to take care of his alcoholic father known simply as "Mr. Grant" (Malcolm Atterbury) because he cannot hold a steady job. As a result, he barely makes ends meet by working the nightshift at a warehouse operated by some rather seedy businessmen. To his credit, his manages to keep his grades up and even has hopes of getting a scholarship to a nearby college upon graduation. Recognizing this, the prettiest girl at the high school "Betty Alexander" (Virginia Aldridge) pretends to be attracted to him in order to have him write an important term paper which will allow her to graduate. Needless to say, her current boyfriend "Vince Rumbo" (Howard Veit) doesn't particular like it when he sees the two of them together, but he calms down when she explains what is really going on. Unfortunately, while Betty might be able to fool Marv, her luck runs out when the English teacher easily recognizes the fraud she has committed and flunks her on the spot. Naturally, no longer having any use for him, Betty immediately breaks things off with Marv and goes back to Vince. For his part, Marv misreads the situation and thinks that he can make things up to her if he suddenly acquires a lot of money. To that effect, after he overhears his boss talking about putting $1 million in the office safe, he comes up with a plan to steal it that very night. What he doesn't count on, however, is Betty telling Vince about his plans. Now, rather than reveal any more, I will just say that this was a very basic, low budget, grade-B movie which suffered from a weak script and somewhat moralistic overtones. Admittedly, I liked the performance of Virginia Aldridge who seemed quite convincing in her role. Even so, the scenes didn't seem to mesh together very well which gave the film a rather choppy feel to it. Likewise, the rather abrupt ending didn't help either. Be that as it may, while I don't consider this to be a bad movie necessarily, the flaws just mentioned were much too apparent and I have rated it accordingly. Slightly below average.

Several performances that young Tom Pittman did were released posthumously the following year after his tragic death in an automobile crash in 1958. High School Big Shot was the last of them and I feel bad that this is the epitaph of young Tom's career. He should better be remembered as one of Dean Jagger's sons in The Proud Rebel.

But for better or worse Pittman was the lead in this independent B feature probably popular in drive-ins at the time. He plays a poor and sensitive kid who for love of the high school vixen Virginia Aldridge embarks on a life of crime.

Truth be told he's not got much of a life to begin with, but he has a shot at a college scholarship that his English teacher Peter Leeds is going to recommend him for. But when Pittman is discovered doing a paper for Aldridge, Leeds withdraws his recommendation. I think that was a bit much. If Leeds had any understanding he would have known it was the kid's hormones in overdrive which they are at that age.

Anyway Pittman finds that the warehouse he works at after school is to be used as a drop for syndicate money, untraceable syndicate money to be used to purchase heroin. And Pittman finds a safe-cracker in Stanley Adams to help him with the job.

But it all goes wrong, not the least of which is that Pittman tells Aldridge and she tells her hoodlum boyfriend Howard Veit who decides he wants the loot. It all ends in a bloody mess.

Adams is good as the philosophical safe-cracker and Malcolm Atterbury contributes a nice performance as Pittman's alcoholic father. But the film such as it is belongs to Pittman who is a sensitive soul gone terribly wrong. And I'm sure Pittman knew this one was a Thanksgiving feast yet his performance in this very cheaply made film is good.

And this review is dedicated to Tom Pittman another sad Hollywood tragedy.

Times I look back to high school and it amazes me that I never went lower than Marvin did in this BAD film.

Poor Marv is the main character who's bad luck just gets worse and worse. Despite his intelligence, he manages to get bullied, exploited, supports his lousy deadbeat Dad, and plenty more goof-ups including a daring heist which let's say doesn't go fully to plan. Of course, the viewer feels no empathy with anyone in this film, so all this disastrous gloom bounces off like harmless zeta rays. Recommended for those days you're feeling down, pop this film in and you'll smile and say, "I'm so glad I'm not Marv!"

My favorite riff from High School Big Shots airing on the best show ever. While being aired on MST3K is a sure sign of being a clunker this film actually has a bit to offer and the story has been regurgitated countless times in bigger budget modern day action pictures, Dead Presidents and Revevoir Dogs (which is itself a shot by shot rip off of a Hong Kong action picture) to name a couple. Not to say H.S.B.S was any sort of originator but it's certainly watchable without the zingers flying from Mike and the Bots. This thing oozes cheese but it also maintains a nice grit. Poor Marv gets screwed out of a sure college scholarship after being duped by some bimbo, dad's a suicidal drunk, the big heist is an obvious debacle waiting to happen and when it does unravel people die. Like I said , High School Big Shot wasn't an originator but it has it's imitators and thats something you can't say for many MSTied movies.