wild boys of the road
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wild boys of the road is a marvelous piece of americana, a look at the social confusion of the depression era .
wild boys of the road (1933) - - (movie clip) i ...
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rush. “rev. of wild boys of the road. ” variety. 26 sep 1933, 20 .
wild boys of the road (1933) - - (movie clip) i was ...
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title drop :
police alarmed at increase in wild boys of the road
is a newspaper headline .
wild boys of the road is a 1933 drama directed by william a wellman, about the plight of homeless teenagers during the great depression .
an impoverished girl masquerades as a boy to run with a gang of young hobos in wild boys of the road (1933) .
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an impoverished girl masquerades as a boy to run with a gang of young hobos in wild boys of the road (1933). >
wild boys of the road... is disappointing, primarily because it might have been so much more than it is .
a clip from the 1930 film -
wild boys of the road
. i am not affiliated with the creators nor claim rights to the film .
wild boys of the road was not a financial success and much like today’s audiences, the public of 1933 seemed to prefer their movies to be of a lighter fare .
nugent, frank s. “rev. of wild boys of the road. ” new york times. 22 sep 1933. accessed 12 sep 2015. urltoken
there are no featured audience reviews yet. click the link below to see what others say about wild boys of the road (dangerous days) !
while wild boys of the road can feel like the flip side of carvel, an andy hardy movie gone awry, it’s another mickey rooney movie that makes for a more logical follow - up: boys town (1938) .
really the climax of the opening chapters confirming the virtues of the protagonists, eddie (frankie darro) gives his unemployed dad (grant mitchell) the proceeds from selling his car, in wild boys of the road, 1933. >
loved the energy of this heartfelt depression - era social - conscious road film .
the introduction of decent - but - broke heroes eddie (frankie darro) and tommy (edwin phillips), from william a. wellman' s acclaimed great depression drama wild boys of the road, 1933. >
upon the release of his autobiography i attended a screening of “wild boys of the road” and “the ox - bow incident” hosted by william wellman. he was very proud of this picture and the demand that he produce a more optimistic ending than intended led to his placing the cartwheel as a form of sarcasm .
coached by older hobos, the boys overwhelm some railroad thugs, then eddie (frankie darro) discovers the wounded grace (rochelle hudson) and they take revenge on brakeman ward bond, in william a. wellman' s wild boys of the road, 1933. >
on their first night riding the rails, eddie (frankie darro) and tommy (edwin phillips) encounter the feisty sally (dorothy coonan, who became the wife of director william a. wellman) in wild boys of the road, 1933. >
in the depths of the depression, two teenage boys strike out on their own in order to help their struggling parents and find life on the road tougher than expected .
papa wolf: the boys strike back at the brakesman after he rapes grace .
one of the films more tongue in cheek scenes has young eddie whistling, we’re in the money as he walks away from his empty garage after selling his jalopy to help his family financially. the song, of course, was from gold diggers of 1933 which came out only three months earlier than wild boys of the road .
edwin phillips, who acted in barely any other movies, holds his own alongside frankie, and is especially good with him after the tragedy in the railroad yard, and later in the sewer pipe city, where he struggles to come to terms with the physical maladies of the road. dorothy coonan, who director wellman married after completion of wild boys of the road, is involved slightly less than the two boys, but is as much of a charmer to audiences as she is to all of those adults in the movie who scrunch their noses back at her .
wild boys of the road ,
the new picture at the hollywood, is disappointing, primarily because it might have been so much more than it is. dealing with the problem of the host of young americans whom the depression turned loose upon the nation' s highways, the film might have been at once tragic, dramatic and a stirring call for remedial action. view full article in timesmachine »
despite some outdated dialogue and an ending that seems somewhat out of place, wild boys of the road is an agonizing look at the plight of america’s young homeless during the depression, and the lack of government empathy reflected by then president hoover’s failed approach to ending the depression. his belief that aiding the average u. s. citizen would only make them lazy and depend more and more on government (2) .
i’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for the juvenile delinquent movies of the 50’s. i’m not exactly sure why but young troublemakers often make for fun movies. the 50’s may have mastered the genre but every decade in movie history has had its share of troubled teens. today we head to the pre - code era of the 30’s and a film that could be seen as a grandaddy to the delinquent films of the 50’s. directed by william wellman, director of the first best picture winner wings, it’s 1933’s wild boys of the road .
i had seen pictures of the wild children of revolution - racked russia. i had read of the free youth of germany after the world war. i knew that in every nation, following a plague, an invasion, or a revolution, children left without parents and homes became vagrants. before my own experiences i had always believed that in america we managed things better (minehan xvi). before wild boys of the road came to america’s movie houses, a sociologist named thomas minehan had spent two summers, plus weekends and holidays, integrating himself among america’s youth on the road. the result was his classic…
famous sequence in which eddie (frankie darro), sally (dorothy coonan) and the gang, especially tommy (edwin phillips), de - train as they come into columbus, arthur hohl the doctor they visit, in william a. wellman' s wild boys of the road, 1933. >
wild boys of the road is certainly a grim reminder of the great depression. i remember my grandfather telling me he lost his job in 1931 (he was 32 years old with a wife and 3 small sons), then had his radio repossessed and then lost his house. i really felt the history when watching this film. thanks for the excellent review .
despite an upbeat ending wild boys of the road is one of the darkest, bleakest films of the depression era. william wellman already had a reputation for going straight for the jugular, as he did in his previous film, heroes for sale. he did not beat around the bush. while films like gold diggers of 1933 dealt with the great depression, it was mostly light hearted and escapist. you get no such relief in this 1933 hard core pre - code drama .
the film - - as propulsive as a locomotive - - is sympathetic to the plight of the young, the unemployed, the female and the ethnic (the' boys republic' is open to black and jewish youngsters) .
while the film is erratic in its brilliance, there are scenes that are truly disturbing and unsettling. one scene shows the young homeless boys and girls fighting with the police as they try to hold onto their sewer city “home. ” wellman, always on the side of the underdog, presents the police as symbols of an autocratic system. by using an excellent combination of close - ups and editing, the scene in which tommy’s leg is crushed is both brutal and affectively moving. the authenticity of the boxcar and railroad yards scene, s filmed on location, certainly adds to the film’s realism. wild boys of the road is still a strong look at the depression, the forced lawlessness, the poverty and the victimization of youth. the film gives you a strong punch in the gut that you will soon not forget .
sweet polly oliver: sally dresses as a boy and continues to wear boys' clothes throughout the film .
the trio meet up with other youthful wanderers and the most intriguing parts of wild boys of the road becomes the escalating episodes of vagrancy in the middle of the movie. the parts that terrorized and turned off early reviewers. most of the highlights come on the trains or in the railroad yards, though i’m partial to the scene when sally discovers her aunt is a madam after the cops arrive to make a pinch. there are no greener pastures. in addition to the more shocking single scenes are a series of confrontations with authority, adults who take no pleasure in their duty, but whose service demand they take the proper steps and shoo away the vagabonds to the next town. everyone feels for them, but nobody wants them .
the wild boys
is burroughs & apos; s fifth or sixth or seventh book. the gang of totally sadistic homosexual young snopeses who come into the book in the last third are not important except as a culmination of the continual fantasy of boys in rainbow - colored jockstraps coldly doffing them; nor are they important to the book. nothing here is any more important than anything else, except possibly burroughs & apos; s unusually tender memories of adolescent sex around the golf course and locker rooms in his native st. louis in the 1920 & apos; s. but the wild boys are apaches of freedom, and so are different from the
thought - control mob ,
the narcotic cops and the despots of the communications monopolies who are the villains of burroughs & apos; s other books - - espeically
nova express .
the wild boys in this book are a positive force for freedom: i. e. , they have such an aversion to women (to burroughs, women are the thought - control mob in infancy) that the boys continue the race by artificial insemination and thus, gott zu dank, a
whole generation arose that had never seen a woman & apos; s face nor heard a woman & apos; s voice .
frankie darro, who previously appeared for wellman at the opening of the public enemy (1931), leads the cast and the honors. a great talent, blessed with the skills of a mickey rooney, but cursed by similar stature and a less trustworthy face, darro otherwise had all of the tools for stardom. his biographer and friend, john gloske, noted that this was frankie’s favorite of his movies, and wrote that “until his death he would keep a newspaper stuffed away that he would gladly pull out and show to guests, ” a front page that showed the huge crowd surrounding the premiere of wild boys of the road (57) .
i had seen pictures of the wild children of revolution - racked russia. i had read of the free youth of germany after the world war. i knew that in every nation, following a plague, an invasion, or a revolution, children left without parents and homes became vagrants .
it' s a cinematic blast of anger and outrage and exasperation sprung from the immediacy of the depression .
wild boys of the road is one of six movies directed by william wellman that is included in warner home video' s 2009 dvd set, forbidden hollywood collection volume 3. other titles are other men' s women, the purchase price, frisco jenny, midnight mary, and heroes for sale. included among the special features are two documentaries, wild bill: hollywood maverick, which is more of a traditional documentary, and the men who made the movies: william a. wellman, which is packed with wellman in wellman' s own words. i' ve probably watched this forbidden hollywood collection more than any of their other sets .
the tomatometer score — based on the opinions of hundreds of film and television critics — is a trusted measurement of critical recommendation for millions of fans. it represents the percentage of professional critic reviews that are positive for a given film or television show .
the movie debut of albert finney, at work in the raleigh ...
in reality, the new roosevelt administration quickly attempted to curb the problem of transient youth through new deal programs like the civilian conservation corps and various services formed under the federal transient relief service (fera) and, later, the works progress administration (wpa). the problem was ultimately curtailed by america’s entry into world war ii as young men both entered into service and vacated jobs at home, providing opportunity to those who were previously left without work. for those of us who came along later, wild boys of the road captures an american experience that seems beyond belief, yet was thought of as over - sentimentalized by the film critic for the nation' s top newspaper .
wild boys of the road begins with a fairly playful style to it. darro and phillips certainly have a sort of leo gorcey / huntz hall dead end kids approach to their parts. the lightheartedness fades quickly, though. the film becomes pretty dark. it is a pre - code, after all. i mean we’ve got murder, rape, and gangs of hoods attacking the police. not to mention one of the main characters getting his leg crushed by a train followed by a back alley amputation. it is a grim picture of the depression era and still packs quite a wallop today. of course, the most graphic elements of the story, like the rape and the crushed leg, take place off camera; still, you can’t really say that the film pulls any punches. these moments are shocking and cast a darkness over the film that lingers with the viewer .
an expression of the frustration and rage felt by thousands of anonymous american caught up in the paralyzing dislocation of the great depression. the story centers on two teens, in particular who are forced to ride the rails when their own parents are thrown out of work .
when i first met wild boys of the road, as someone who had grown up in a comparatively cozy era two generations removed from the great depression, it seemed more like an alternate history that could have never happened than any sort of former american reality. it’s depressing stuff, and hard to take, these children on the lam, losing limbs, risking rape, living in sewer pipe cities, and doing their best to grin and bear it without stopping to think tomorrow will probably be worse .
just the top of the
yankee doodle boy
number from george ...
note: the views expressed here are only those of the reviewer (s) .
as hollywood got to know him, ahearn was compared to jim tully (who worked on the story for wellman' s similar beggars of life [ 1928 ]), but beyond picture snatcher and wild boys of the road, the only other story of ahearn' s adapted to film was bulldog edition for republic in 1936. this mysterious figure was eventually convicted of a robbery and assault that landed him a life sentence in 1948. a technicality lowered that sentence to 15 - to - 30 years in 1952, with the possibility of parole in six years. whether ahearn ever got out or not is a mystery. he died in obscurity in 1960 at age 59 .
don' t you dare pity me! : the boys are said not to help tommy up after he falls over, for this reason .
you could probably make a case that the end of the film wraps everything up a bit too neatly. not to give it all away, but what plays out on screen seems to point to a brighter future for eddie, tommy and sally. yet, it also leaves a lot up to the audience. after all that had transpired in the hour leading up to that, my brain wasn’t convinced that all turned out well after the screen faded to black. it looks like a happy ending on the surface, but i just wasn’t so sure. i suppose that’s a testament to the skill with which wild boys of the road was crafted .
james l. neibaur of urltoken calls it :
one of the most interesting and important film books of the young year ,
adding ,
the documentation is original and significant .
full review .
above: ann hovey in the clutches of ward bond, the same memorable scene captured in the advertisement above it .
random events plot: the movie is very episodic, showing what happens when each of the friends moves to a new location in search of work .
the underrated william a. wellman made many neglected classics during the depression, and this 1933 feature is one of the very best .
alison drake, the tough - minded executive of an automobile factory, succeeds in the man' s world of business until she meets an independent design engineer .
the introduction of decent - but - broke heroes eddie (frankie ...
above: the same open letter on the other side of the country, clipped from the portsmouth herald (nh), november 29, 1933, page 4 .
the young cast turns in some impressive performances. darro especially gives his role a optimistic spirit that likely resonated with 1930’s audiences, despite the unpleasantness not only on the screen but also in the world that awaited them beyond the theater doors. i also really enjoyed sterling holloway who provides a small degree of comic relief to the film. given the dark nature of the rest of the proceedings, he tickles the funny bone just enough to ease tension on the audience, but not come across as out - of - place .
frankie darro stars in director william a. wellman’s grim story of america’s transient youth. ripped freshly from the headlines and released in september 1933. vivid scenes of riding the rails across the country and sometimes violent consequences suffered by young people at the mercy of society and authority .
sally' s piece of cake jumps from the plate into her hands between shots .
at west point, 1857, in the conceit of wally kline and ...
living through the great depression was tough for many including the thousands and thousands of dispossessed youngsters riding boxcars and living in shantytowns. wellman, or as he was known “wild bill” wellman was a tough son of a bitch, yet he worked within the studio system fighting for good scripts. legend has it he once dumped a trunk load of manure onto a studio bosses desk along with a script that he felt the same way about (1) .
rape as drama: grace, one of the girls on the train, gets left behind when the others are battling the railroad mooks. she is raped by a brakeman .
this earnest, socially - conscious road drama centers on two california teenagers who find their comfortable lives thrown into turmoil during the great depression. to find work for themselves, the adventurous lads sneak aboard a chicago - bound train .
the library of congress announced wednesday the addition of 25 films to its national film registry, a growing archive of american motion pictures earmarked for preservation because of their cultural, historic or aesthetic significance. according to librarian of congress james h. billington, who hand - picks the films each year from a shortlist winnowed from thousands of online suggestions, the national film registry — which includes everything from home movies to hollywood blockbusters — is not just a best - of list, or even a list of his favorite films, but a “vehicle for understanding our culture and society more broadly. ”
don' t let the giddy jazz age prologue or the deliriously happy ending fool you: this is one of the bleakest films from the 1930s that i' ve ever seen .
road trip plot: a harrowing journey from middle america to chicago and thence to cleveland and new york, scrounging for food and trying to avoid arrest and / or assault .
jean genet is a hero to burroughs, but genet & apos; s masturbatory fantasies were undergone in prison, and were in the service of love. genet is indeed an addict of love, which is why his novels and plays are crowded with people. burroughs seems to me the victim of solitude. he expresses it in the coldness with which partners are dismissed :
the boy shoved the dib & apos; s body away as if he were taking off a garment .
the comic moments in
the wild boys
are not situations but jokes :
bearded yippies rush down a street with hammers breaking every window on both sides leave a wake of screaming burglar alarms strip off the beards, reverse collars and they are fifty clean priests throwing petrol bombs under every car whoosh a block goes up behind them .
to that end, the 2013 honorees include three early works from the silent era: “a virtuous vamp” (1919), “daughter of dawn” (1920), and the proto - feminist cinderella tale “ella cinders” (1926). the inclusion of these titles will come as particularly good news to fans of silent cinema, many of whom were no doubt alarmed this month to learn, through a report issued by the library of congress, that as many as three - quarters of all silent films made through the 1920s have been lost or utterly damaged .
the young tramps seldom remain a week in any community. relief policies force them to move. in addition, there is the lure of the road inspiring them with hope of better times just beyond the hills and a nervous ‘itching foot’ for travel per se. it was, in truth, impossible for the transient boy or girl to stay anywhere when this study was made. relief authorities gave a meal and an invitation to move on. no matter how tired he or she was, how willing to work, how weary and disgusted with the road and its aimless wandering, he had to take to it. police did not trouble transients so long as they kept moving. as soon as they attempted to halt, however, police acted. jungles were raided, soup and bread lines searched for non - residents, mission lists combed. the child tramp was out again on the road (54) .
illiam s. burroughs is a great autoeroticist - - of writing, not sex. he gets astral kicks by composing in blocks, scenes, repetitive and identical memories galvanizing themselves into violent fantasies, the wild mixing of pictures, words, the echoes of popular speech. it is impossible to suspect him of any base erotic motives in his innumerable scenes of one adolescent boy servicing another like a piece of plumbing; nor should one expect a book from him different from his others. burroughs is the purest writer in barney rosset & apos; s grove, and not just because in this book he more than ever turns his obsession with cold, callous homosexual coupling into a piece of american science fiction .
the threat to older films is well established, partly as a result of the library of congress’s efforts to raise awareness. but more recent works are also highly fragile. filmmaker michael moore, whose groundbreaking documentary “roger & me” is also on the list of 2013 inductees, says he was recently dismayed to discover — when the new york film festival requested a copy of his film for the festival’s 50th anniversary — that there were no prints of the 1989 film that had not “faded to pink. ”
jacqueline t. lynch, author of ann blyth: actress. singer. star. , says :
a prime example of a classic film fan taking the reins to produce a scholarly study of a neglected figure from the golden age of classic films in a way that i feel is refreshing, infinitely helpful to fans and students of old movies .
full review .
while on the train they meet another runaway, sally (dorothy coonan). she is heading for chicago to stay with her aunt. when they arrive in the windy city, most of the other young transients on the train are hauled off by the fuzz, but since dorothy has a letter from her aunt, she and the boys are able to stay. too bad sally’s aunt has her own problems with the police and is hauled off shortly after the trio arrives at her apartment .
burroughs & apos; s whole esthetic and his suspicion of every political idea are the same: let me alone! even his endlessly fascinated, obsessive recall of homosexual intercourse says - - let me alone. there is no lovemaking, no interest in love, not even much interest in the sensation of orgasm. the emphasis is on emission as the end product. the idea is to show in how many different scenes and with how many coldly selected partners one can do it. but repetition, that fatally boring element in burroughs & apos; s
cut - ups ,
turns the coupling into an obsessive primal scene that never varies in its details. the technical arrangements never vary, but they are described with such unwearied relish that the
wild boys
and their sadistic knives, scissors, gougers, castrators, etc. , etc. , seem like the embroidery of a cruel dream, not wickedness .
punch clock villain: the cops in cleveland, who are just following orders when they turn the fire hoses on the children' s tramp village. one mentions that he has a couple of kids of his own at home .
spared by the adaptation: in the original story sally is the character who is raped on the train, and she hangs herself. in the movie the rape happens to another character, grace, and sally ends the movie alive .
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lakeith stanfield and his sorry to bother you director boots riley discuss the stress of filming sex scenes .
there is a very good book on the films of the depression called “we’re in the money” written back in the 1970’s but is still in print today. there is also a documentary, that actually played in movie theaters back in the mid 70’s called “brother, can you spare a dime”, which is an excellent source of depression era material. i remember clips including scenes of the stock market crash, dance marathons, breadlines and the new deal. plus there are a lot of clips from movies like “little caesar. ”, “gold diggers of 1993” and many others .
credit three excellent lead actors for lightening this dose of reality. director william a. wellman also includes many little touches to occasionally lighten the mood, whinnying horses and stolen cakes, the wrinkly - nosed smiles of the actress he' d soon marry, and sterling holloway doing pretty much anything, as usual. then there’s the athleticism of star frankie darro bunny - hopping into a trash can or letting loose with a series of handsprings, youth keeping him an admirable bundle of energy no matter how downtrodden life is around him. but the overall tone is morbid, and even the happy ending doesn’t seem so very happy if you stop to think about it on the way out of the theater. the future is bleak .
in the 1930' s depression, teenage boys and girls leave home to make their own way in the world and to take the burden off their parents. travelling by train & foot, they rarely find any work and starve most of the way, and one character loses a leg in the process. eventually arrested, the three main characters are sent to court, where a sympathetic judge sends them back unpunished, giving them recommendations for jobs and a more hopeful future .
moore applauds the work being done by the library of congress’s packard campus in culpeper, va. , where films on the national film registry are typically housed, in collaboration with other archives. he also acknowledges the simple prestige of being included in such august company. “to me, ” says moore, “this honor goes on the same shelf as the oscar and the palme d’or. ”
r. d. – you are right, that was “pettin in the park” you heard. i guess warner’s was saving money. i recorded most of the wellman films that night. i watched “midnight mary” and it was decent, certainly not as good as “wild boys. ” still have to watch “heroes for sale” and “frisco jenny. ” darro was certainly agile. i meant to say something about that leap he did in the trash can, it was amazing! did you happen to watch the documentary on wellman that was part of “the men who made the movies” series. he was an interesting character. as a former world war i pilot, he performed one of his own stunts in his first film, “wings”, when the stunt man could not do it. it required that when landing, the plane was to flip over! wellman did it and walked away with minor scratches .
they end up getting on the train once again, joined by a number of other youths (including one played by a young sterling holloway). they soon number in the hundreds. their numbers are so big, in fact, that when confronted by authorities at another station, the boys rise up and fight back. after defeating the cops, they turn their attention to the train’s brakeman (an uncredited ward bond) who raped one of the other young female transients (rochelle hudson) during the battle with the cops. he ends being tossed off the train to his presumed death. the good times continue when the gang jumps off the train and tommy ends up losing a leg as he struggles to get out of the way of an oncoming locomotive. as time moves on, eddie, tommy and sally make their way to a “sewer pipe city” in columbus, oh and eventually to new york city as they struggle to survive .
established in 1989, the national film registry now numbers a total of 625 films, and includes such obvious classics as “citizen kane” (1941); “the wizard of oz” (1939) and “casablanca” (1942), along with such surprising choices as amateur filmmaker abraham zapruder’s 1963 footage of the kennedy assassination; jon landis’s 1983 music video for michael jackson’s “thriller”; and a 1972 short known as “a computer animated hand. ” created as a college project by one of the men who went on to found pixar, it’s thought to be one of the earliest example of 3 - d computer animation .
above: clipped from the medford mail tribune of medford or, november 22, 1933, page 4 .
“we can preserve only a small fraction of threatened films, ” says morrison, who described himself as overjoyed about the news of his film’s selection. coincidentally, his prints of “decasia” were destroyed in flooding from hurricane sandy, although the museum of modern art had stored his negative, allowing morrison to reprint the film. the many layers of destruction and creation involved in “decasia” make it a work that gives people “lots to chew on, ” says morrison. being honored with preservation by the nation’s biggest library is, he says, “yet another layer” to the story .
the fact is, he is mad about anything that he can get down on paper. he loves, literally, being engaged in the act of writing, filling up paper from the scene immediately present to him. composition by field, as the black mountain used to say; plus composition by frenzy and delight, and in any direction. words, horrid isolate words, those symbols of our enslavement, are replaced by the a - b - c of man & apos; s perception of simultaneous factors - - the ability to drink up the
scanning pattern .
get it down when it is still hot, vibrant and wild to your consciousness! the literary impulse is more daemonic to burroughs than sex was to sade, but can be just as nonconductive to onlookers .
an effective pre - code social drama. a group of children travel to find jobs during the depression. the story is potent, but dated, and the studio wanted ...
excellent. i feel i know the movie, but now i realize i only thought i did. looking forward to my next viewing through the lens of all the information you provided .
a tenant farmer' s son is caught in the middle of owner - tenant disputes when he falls for the plantation owner' s seductive daughter .
the story was adapted for wellman by earl baldwin from an original by danny ahearn, who is probably the most interesting character with any hand in this classic. ahearn, who also wrote the original story that warner bros. turned into picture snatcher (1933), was promoted as the man who committed—and got away with—a couple of murders. he had credibility along those lines as author of a book called how to commit a murder (and all the major crimes on the calendar and get away with it), which supposedly fulfilled the promise of its title. a review of ahearn' s book in the july 1930 issue of true detective described what was inside :
great movie, until the ending, which is a campaign speech for fdr and the new deal. this is the second good wellman picture to flub the ending. the other ...
alfred kazin teaches at the state university of new york at stony brook. his books include
contemporaries
and
starting out in the thirties .
mooks: the railroad thugs sent to chase the kids off the trains. after the kids realize they outnumber the railroad mooks by a large margin, they attack them, and chase them off .
i saw this on tcm a few years ago and i thought it was devastating. it was heartbreaking. i was rather shocked, and it’s haunted me in a way, ever since. the ending was kind of ridiculous. the actors were wonderful, i wish this movie was more well known. it seems to be buried in favor of the typical giddy gaudy 30’s baubles everyone is familiar with. wbotr is a dark shadow at the end of the driveway of a 30’s white art deco mansion .
this is how they did it, the transition in which the ...
in the town for which the movie is named, sheriff shaw ...
coming of age story: a particularly dark one, as two fresh - faced teens suffer terribly during the depression .
frankie darro as a can - do kid searching for work amidst the urban jungle of depression - era new york .
the supporting cast is filled with familiar faces including rochelle hudson as eddie’s date at the beginning of the movie; grant mitchell and claire mcdowell as eddie’s parents; minna gombell as sally’s aunt; sterling holloway as the oddball drifter; ann hovey as the poor girl who ward bond stumbles upon; willard robertson as the detective sorting through the kids off the train; arthur hohl, playing nice as a jungle surgeon; and robert barrat as the juvenile court judge pitying the kids .
the most modern film yet accepted into the registry, which is restricted to works at least 10 years old, is “ decasia, ” a 2002 experimental collage piece by new york artist bill morrison. ironically, it was assembled from deteriorating film footage, some of which morrison says he found at — wait for it — the library of congress. according to the artist, “decasia” is not a call to arms, but rather a celebration — in such sequences as one in which a boxer appears to be battling a blob of decaying film stock — of the beauty and inevitability of decay .
cop dave (joe partridge) puzzles over a series of women ...
ahearn tells exactly how to cover one' s tracks after committing a murder. he discusses crime with the flair of one who knows it and he makes it clear that there lives in the midst of the law - abiding people of this country a strange and dangerous group apart. people who have different habits, customs, methods of living, ethics and dangers. people who have no center balance—who are either up in prosperity or down in despair; who are either in or out—and far too many of them out (8) .
our story follows two teens, eddie (frankie darro) and tommy (edwin phillips). they’ve got themselves a car and a regular stream of young ladies willing to climb into the backseat with them. life is good. that is, until tommy reveals that he and his mother have been living off the community chest for the last few months. to make matters worse, eddie soon learns that his father has been laid off, too. both boys decide to drop out of school and get jobs, but works is scarce. even selling the car only puts a measly $ 22 in their pockets. they soon decide their best move is to relieve their parents of the burden of caring for them. they end up jumping a train, hobo style, and heading east .
the cast led by frankie darro, edwin phillips, dorothy coonan and rochelle hudson all give good performances. darro, never seemed to out grow juvenile roles, though his career lasted a long time appearing in films like “a day at the races, saratoga, the babe ruth story and such serials as junior g - men of the air and the phantom empire dorothy coonan, who appeared in 42 nd street and gold diggers of 1933 as a chorus girl caught the eye of william wellman and would soon become the fourth and final mrs. william wellman. the marriage would produce seven children. also in the film are the fine character actors sterling holloway, grant mitchell and minna gombell .
an impoverished girl masquerades as a boy to run with a gang of young hobos .
cerebus retcon: a gag when eddie comes home from the dance has him cutting a slice of apple pie... and putting the tiny slice back in the fridge while he prepares to eat the big part. then he finds out his father has lost his job, and he goes back to the kitchen to take the smaller slice instead .
decomposite character: sally is the one who gets raped in the book. in the film this happens to another character called grace .
happy ending: forced on wellman by executive meddling. in the original script, it' s a downer ending where the judge sends the kids to jail. in the finished film, the judge relents and promises to get the kids work and places to stay .
thanks for your thoughts on what your family went through. my father was a young man during the depression and i remember him telling me that one of his brothers went to work on one of the government works programs. again, thanks for your comments .
kangaroo court: a very short and sweet version of one when the kids, after finding out that the brakeman raped grace, throw him off a moving train to his death .
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interview with jacqueline t. lynch on her new biographyy of ann blyth – click on photo
samus is a girl: eddie suspects another hobo of stealing their sandwiches. eddie confronts the other hobo and gets a bloody nose before finding out the hobo is a girl, sally .
i write about old movies and movie stars from the 1920s to the 1950s. i also sell movie cards, still photos and other ephemera. immortal ephemera connects the stories with the collectibles .
this one’s great, and one of my favorite pre - code discoveries. you’re right that the ending was more or less mandated after the original version– which i believe involved jail time– was deemed too bleak. it was also a reflection of the more optimistic tone warners was trying to give their movies after roosevelt’s election as well .
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this is another one i really want to see, after seeing frankie darro in ‘the mayor of hell’ – it sounds like powerful stuff from your description despite the cop - out at the ending. i will have to wait until a bit later in the year to get the new wellman box set (only available on import in the uk) and will look forward to seeing this then .
burroughs became an imaginative force in our self - indulgent literature of disaster with
naked lunch .
he was able to turn his addiction to morphine, to
junk ,
into a really amazing ability to scrutinize the contents of his restlessly bold, marvelously episodic imagination. his aversion to the hallucinogens (lsd and the like) is significant. he did not want to have his mind changed - - burroughs does not need inspiration! he wanted in the tradition which is really his own, for he transcribes sexual fantasy into literary energy, to make the fullest possible inventory and rearrangement of all the stuff natural to him. he wanted to put his own mind on the internal screen that is his idea of a book .
speakeasy says :
despite her decline, this is not a sad or bleak book but an enjoyable history... any fan of the collectible citadel “films of” book series will appreciate the modern twist on that format, a full biography followed by an expanded filmography .
full review .
michael o' sullivan has covered the arts for the washington post since 1993, contributing reviews and features on film, fine art, theater and other forms of entertainment to style and weekend. follow
own all of the previous' mission: impossible' movies to watch at home for just $ 3. 99 each with ticket purchase. buy tickets
fan disservice: grace changing is not played for titillation, as the shot of her in her underwear has the brakeman approaching her - leaving genre savvy viewers in little doubt as to what happens next .
you say you' ve got to send us to jail to keep us off the streets. well, that' s a lie. you' re sending us to jail because you don' t want to see us. you want to forget us. but you can' t do it because i' m not the only one. there' s thousands just like me, and there' s more hitting the road every day .
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the runaway: eddie, tommy, sally, and the other kids on the trains have run away from home because their parents can' t feed them .
shout out: the movie playing in the theater when eddie is trying to avoid arrest is footlight parade .
great piece, cliff. all the information about the real - life inspiration and research which went into the film are fascinating, as is all the publicity material, including that letter supposedly from the theatre management. i agree with you and lesley that darro is so talented and it is a pity he didn’t make it as an adult star – but he gave us some great performances in this and the mayor of hell .
moore’s no stranger to the detective and / or repair work that is sometimes necessary to bring to light old film footage. his body of work, which some might say has ushered in a new golden age of nonfiction filmmaking, is notable for the inclusion of obscure clips. on occasion, he has personally paid to restore damaged films (such as milos forman’s 1979 “hair”) in order to be able to screen them at the small michigan film festival that he runs .
in between these extremes of old and new, there is much more mainstream fare. this year’s inductees include the 1956 sci - fi ad­ven­ture “forbidden planet, ” notable for being the first film to feature a robot with personality; “the magnificent seven, ” a 1960 western inspired by akira kurasawa’s “seven samurai”; and “pulp fiction, ” quentin tarantino’s 1994 puree of genre films.
wild boys of the road is a 1933 pre-code depression-era american film telling the story of several teens forced into becoming hobos . the film was directed by william wellman from a screenplay by earl baldwin based on the story desperate youth by daniel ahern . the film stars frankie darro . in 2013 the film was selected for preservation in the united states national film registry by the library of congress as being " culturally , historically , or aesthetically significant " . 
wild boys of the road is a 1933 pre-code depression-era american film telling the story of several teens forced into becoming hobos. the film was directed by william wellman from a screenplay by earl baldwin based on the story desperate youth by daniel ahern. the film stars frankie darro. in 2013 the film was selected for preservation in the united states national film registry by the library of congress as being " culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant ".
wild boys of the road is a 1933 pre-code depression-era american film telling the story of several teens forced into becoming hobos. the film was directed by william wellman from a screenplay by earl baldwin based on the story desperate youth by daniel ahern. the film stars frankie darro. in 2013 the film was selected for preservation in the united states national film registry by the library of congress as being " culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant ".