The Green-Eyed Blonde

It was a good movie t'il the end which made basically no sense.

Moving story of a group in a home for wayward girls who find an illegal opportunity to be a family. A new girl, Betsy and a new staff member, Miss Wilson find that they and the rest of the girls in the home, have a lot in common. Miss Wilson finds herself at odds with her employers.

The love scenes with the chain-link fence, not replicated by any as far as I know, is not to be missed.

Greened-Eyed Blond is at times a tear jerker, especially if you have a soft spot. As well as a warning for all teenage girls and the establishment!

I guess this 1957 film was a wake up call for many families who were in the midst of either raising teenage children, or more importantly being teenage children, especially if you were of the female persuasion. I realize that teenagers in the 1950's were more likely to incur an unexpected pregnancy compared to children in the past half century are due to the advances in sex education, and acceptance of women being on the pill (without shame) and men purchasing rubbers over the counter as easy as they can buy a package of gum and/or a chocolate bar.

Nonetheless I recognize the need even in today's society for shelters for young ladies to exist not as much to be imprisoned as this film seems to depict but to protect these young ladies who may have had a one night affair that got them into a bit of a jam, or been associated at a very young age with someone who was a bad influence on them.

The acting in this film was superb, and the (then) 25 year old actress Susan Oliver who plays the green-eyed blonde was certainly a mature leader of this wayward ban of unwed mothers and juvenile delinquents with mental problems or criminal pasts. I won't include any spoilers but I must say on a personal note I did find the storyline a bit hard to relate to even though the circumstances these young ladies found themselves in are very real, even in todays standards.

I give the film a respectable 6 out of 10 IMDB rating.

There is so much to say about this movie: that it is focused on teen pregnancy in a frank way that was never done in 1950s film or literature and portrays the teens in a respectful way, that it has black actresses treated as equal to everyone else in terms of character and a strong, positive black father character, that it addresses the mental health challenges of "troubled" teen girls, that it includes statutory rape by step fathers and on and on. Yes, it's a B movie and has all that comes with that: exaggerated performances, low rent production values and lots of stereotypes. The parents of the main character are almost too horrible and extreme to be believed - unless you are a social worker or teacher and then, yeah, you know these kind of people really do exist, even now (leaving a baby in the back seat of a car, referring to the baby as "it", and on and on). But it's extraordinarily thoughtful for 1957 - that is probably thanks to Dalton Trumbo. Not sure about the title, as this is Betsy's story, not "Green Eyes". Buddy's mom aversion to her son isn't condemned the way it would be in a movie now. The guide to infant care that the girls read from is hilarious - it always has an answer to every question! But be prepared for very, very disturbing behavior by "cuckoo" - if you are horrified by even the mention of animal abuse, don't watch this. As for the ending... no spoilers, but WHAT THE HELL?!?!

The title to this film is odd, as it's NOT the story of one girl but of a group of teens who are incarcerated in a juvenile residential home. The title character is played by Susan Oliver....a 'teen' who was 25 at the time the film was released!

The story is an odd one as at first it seems like an exploitation film (the scene with 'Cuckoo' and the window is classic exploitation fodder) and then backs off from this. And, overall, I am not exactly sure what the message really was in this film. In fact, that there is no message...no moral...that does make the film unique...but also unsatisfying as well. An odd little film.