Bad boys, reform school girls, and teenage werewolves: the juvenile delinquency film in postwar America

This dissertation examines the films produced by the Hollywood studios on the subject of juvenile delinquency during the post-World War II era in order to study the relationship of these films to the dominant societal discourses concerning the delinquency problem, as well as to the changes that the American film industry was undergoing during these years. The period immediately following the end of the Second World War saw a marked rise in concern over juvenile delinquency in the United States. The term “juvenile delinquent” was officially used to describe minors who committed crimes, but in practice it was applied more broadly to marginalize and condemn teen cultures that were seen as opposing or resisting white, middle-class adult culture. Although many in society blamed the mass media for the problem, Hollywood responded to the concern by releasing a number of films that centered on juvenile delinquency. My project investigates the question of how the studios chose to approach the dilemma of making films about a social problem they themselves were partly blamed for. By examining how popular discourses concerning delinquency were translated into onscreen entertainment, the project sheds light on both how the public thought about delinquency, and on how individual films attempted to position themselves in relation to the delinquency issue and its attendant politics of race, class, and gender. Although these films have often been discussed in past studies as the products of a monolithic and unified Hollywood, in fact the films reflect the disunity that was being caused by the transformations the movie industry was undergoing at the time: the films varied dramatically in their attitudes, production strategies, and target audiences. My project shows how the juvenile delinquency film was closely tied to the rise of the teen exploitation producers, who attempted to consciously distance themselves from the established studios in order to appeal to a teenage audience that was growing in significance and influence. This dissertation argues that juvenile delinquency films occupy an important and undervalued position in the history of American film, as they simultaneously reflect and inform the cultural upheaval that was going on in the country’s relationship to its youth, and they play an important role in the postwar transformations of the American movie business into one in which teenage filmgoers assume a central role.