Juvenile Court

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Movie
Original title Juvenile Court
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1938
length 60 minutes
Rod
Director D. Ross Lederman
script Michael L. Simmons ,
Robert E. Kent ,
Henry Taylor
production Irving Briskin ,
Ralph Cohn
music Sidney Cutner
camera Benjamin H. Kline
cut Byron Robinson
occupation

Juvenile Court is a 1938 American drama film starring Paul Kelly and Rita Hayworth .

action

Stubby Adams is an orphaned boy from a poor New York neighborhood during the Great Depression of the 1930s. When he and his gang are throwing stones at the police, he and his friend Daniel Olsen, jokingly called Pighead, are arrested. The defense attorney Gary Franklin, who once grew up in poor circumstances, then takes over the case. He is of the opinion that the street children must be helped by the authorities to keep them away from violence and crime. To this end, with the help of Stubby's friends and his sister Marcia, he wants to found a small organization called the Police Athletic League - P. A. L. for short - which is supposed to establish a constant friendship between the street children and the police. Marcia is immediately enthusiastic about the project and generously offers her support, while the young rebels remain skeptical at first. Ultimately, Franklin and Marcia manage to convince the youngsters of the benefits of the project.

In order to collect the necessary money for the P.A.L., Franklin soon organized a boxing match. Stubby, who is supposed to do his part as an usher , frivolously steals a few dollars from the cash register and rushes off in a stolen car with Pighead and the rest of their gang. As Franklin and the police chase her, Pighead gets nervous and jumps out of the moving car, seriously injuring himself. Stubby and the other boys guiltily return to help Pighead, who it turns out is in dire need of a doctor. As Stubby goes to get medical help, he hears on the radio how Franklin vigorously defends the P.A.L. despite the gang's recent raid and continues to believe in the organization's future. And so Stubby decides to face the police and inform them of Pighead's whereabouts. Contrary to expectations, the police soon gave Stubby a new chance. Now Franklin and Marcia can continue their project together.

background

After Sidney Kingsley's play Dead End had been successfully filmed as a dead end by United Artists in 1937 and Warner Brothers brought the gangster film Chicago - Angels with Dirty Faces with James Cagney , Humphrey Bogart and Ann Sheridan onto the market in 1938, the theme was in the United States Juvenile delinquency extremely popular at the box office. So Columbia Pictures decided to jump on the bandwagon and produce Juvenile Court .

Reviews

"The tough little guy on the big city streets is always fighting the depths of humiliation," said Bosley Crowther of the New York Times . He found "himself in a 'B-minus' film, an old film story that, in this case, was poorly told". For Weekly Variety , Juvenile Court was "largely an infusion of a familiar subject that was rushed through the production mill". There is “nothing interesting in the script, direction or performance”. Everything just seems "very trite". Hal Erickson of the All Movie Guide said in retrospect that Rita Hayworth “basically has nothing else to do” “other than stand around and look pretty”.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Gerald Peary: Rita Hayworth. Your films - your life . Heyne, Munich 1981, pp. 64-65.
  2. ↑ “It's mostly a rehash of a familiar theme, hurried through the production mill. Nothing of interest in the script, direction or performances - all threadbare stuff. " Weekly Variety quoted. after Gene Ringgold: The Films of Rita Hayworth . Citadel Press, Secaucus 1974, p. 94.
  3. ↑ "Rita Hayworth has virtually nothing to do but stand around and look pretty." Hal Erickson , cf. omovie.com