Appendix 3.2: Sample films - synopses and character lists
REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE US 56
empathise, if not to sympathise, with the pragmatic decisions
these particular parents make. Jim's idealism is criticised
by his father, yet in the end it is Jim's insistence that 'we
are all involved' which allows him to act decisively, thus to
become 'a man' in his terms.
The narrative opens with the drunken Jim being brought into
the police station: Judy is there and so is Plato. We witness
each of their interviews and are thus privy to their points of
view before their interactions with each other which
constitute the main body of the narrative. We are also
offered a view of the operations of the State, in this case
exemplified by the juvenile division of the police force, as
an essential mediator between the inadequate parents and
uncontrollable adolescents who between them constitute
American society.
From this preamble the film cuts to the beginning of Jim's
first day at his new school which, via the observatory lecture
and the knife fight, leads to the fatal 'chicken run' in the
evening of the same day. Following Buzz's death Jim, Judy and
Plato hide in the deserted mansion where they are eventually
found by the gang and then by the police. The narrative
climaxes with the chase through the Undergroweth and the
tragic and unnecessary shooting of Plato in front of the
observatory.
Apart from the important opening scenes in the police station
there are three main locations, each of which is shot in a
different style and each of which signifies different aspects
of the dilemma confronting Jim - and adolescents in general.
In the Observatory the incomprehensible vastness of the
universe is presented in a light show to a student audience
apparently impressed, despite themselves, by the solemnity of
the concept; it is in this location too that, later, the final
resolution of Jim's character take? place in the closing scene
when he disarms Plato. Much of the lecture scene is shot in
extreme high or low angle shots, the lighting effects of the
show being used to blur the student audience into an
homogenous mass. Secondly there are the domestic interiors:
these are mainly in Jim's family home, with a few scenes in
the homes of Judy and of Plato. These scenes - particularly
those in the Stark household - are almost exclusively given in
a series of mid shots and close ups which constantly emphasise
the claustrophobic, hemmed in isolation of the teenage
protagonists. Jim is frequently presented in extreme close
up, head bent or cut by the frame as though he cannot be
fitted within the confines of his parents' domesticity. The
cramped framing, the close up shooting and the very slow or
very fast pans which, however, are also always limited in
extent by the domestic scale of the space and which seem to
duplicate the flick of an eye or the sudden turn of the head,
have the effect of binding the audience in to the conflicts
portrayed, emphasising the collective responsibility for
social well being which Jim is seeking and from which his
parents are constantly trying to defend themselves. Thus a
236