The Young Animals

For the missing part from my 1968 heart. I do sure love watching two stars from Oscar winning movies stretching their talents in new film genres.

I saw this in 1968,l. Having parents that as long as I took my 4yo brother with me, could go to a movie every night. I became a connoisseur of AIP and Hammer movies.

There weren't ratings yet, watched Rosemary's Baby alone at 12 yo, Night of the Living Dead and at a midnight sneak with myself a 13 yo and my sisters (only girls in the joint) in a rowdy audience of airmen, flying or servicing the the B52s taking off heavy and landing light after doing their 8,000 mile round trip across the South Pacific.

If you haven't guessed, I'm 13yo, while living in Guam 🇬🇺 as an Air Force dependent. Nothing like watching an AIP teen movie to take your mind off the current news of the day.

There is a website out there somewhere that specializes in the 4 word film review. This movie easily fits into that category (see summary above). It is a typical stereotypical film that religiously follows every imaginable cliché.

The characters are supposed to be high school students, but the lead actor Tony (good chicano) was 33 at the time of the film, and most of the other actors appear to be in their early to mid twenties.

Making a long story short, the good chicano eventually gets the better of the bad gringos, and walks away with a good gringo girl (Patty McCormick), which really burns the bad gringos. The plot is predictable and irrelevant, but if you must watch the film you can get a good history lesson on 60's fashion and cars.

I'm surprised to come here and find the other reviewers almost all rating this higher than I did. Each fight is hilariously terrible. I think the stuff teens put on YouTube looks better staged. In one shot you could even tell the boy slugged was actually jumping back up on the car himself. I guess they couldn't find any stunt-men who looked like they were high school-age? 'Nice to see that A Martinez rose above his being in this. I do agree that the rock was o.k. How many flicks have soundtracks like this? VERY few. And any film with Patty McCormack is worth at least 5 stars so__, though I sure wish Patty had been it more. Yes, I am thankful that the oldies movies stations occasionally put films like this on for me who didn't see it back when it came out.

This was typical for the period, and is still true today. Caucasian bashing. This kind of "reverse discrimination" continues today. The picture began during the genesis of the Socialist "Hippie" movement, as an outgrowth of the "beatnik" to the "social justice" drumbeat of today's "politically correct" silencing of America's majority.

Demonize the dominant culture and make them all appear as hate-filled morons. It was said before "Chicanos good, Caucasians bad". This is not really new. I wouldn't watch it again. There is no point to this malarkey. I would just as soon watch an anti-American flag-burning rally. I became tired of it at age 13 and I am tired of it now.

This film was made on location at Tucson High School in Tucson Arizona. I was in this film as an extra playing a high school student. I have a copy on a CD. I don't remember CHER being in it but will watch it again to be sure. What is depicted in the movie was nothing like real life at THS. What a joke watching it now. But it was cool being in a movie on the big screen at the local drive-in.