FAQ

Jim "Jimbo" Stark (James Dean), a rebelious teenager with a troubled past, finds a "family" with fellow teens Judy (Natalie Wood) and Plato Crawford (Sal Mineo) after he wins a "chickie run" that results in his opponent into driving off a cliff. The three of them hide in an old abandoned mansion until the law catches up with them.

The title for this movie was taken from psychiatrist Robert Lindner's 1944 book, Rebel Without A Cause: The Hypnoanalysis of a Criminal Psychopath but has no other relationship to the book. The screenplay for Rebel Without a Cause was written by Irving Shulman, Stewart Stern, and Nicholas Ray (who also directed this film).

Jim was in custody for underage drinking, Judy was picked up for wandering the streets at 1 AM, and Plato was brought in for shooting some puppies.

The Ride of the Valkyries from Die Walküre, an opera by German composer Richard Wagner (1813-1883).

There's been no definitive answer from the film makers, so the best guess is that the original release date was set for 1956 but the actual release date (27 October, 1955) was fast-tracked to capitalize on James Dean's tragic death.

Jim and Buzz (Corey Allen) were driving stolen cars. After both cars went over the cliff, Jim drove home in his own car.

Dean was killed in a head-on collision while driving his Porsche 550 Spyder on what was then U.S. Route 466 (now State Route 46) near Cholame, California on the afternoon of September 30, 1955, one month before the release of Rebel Without a Cause.