Blackboard Jungle is a 1955 American social drama film about an English teacher in an interracial inner-city school, based on the 1954 novel The Blackboard Jungle by Evan Hunter and adapted for the screen and directed by Richard Brooks.
The film is regarded for its innovative use of contemporary music in its soundtrack, particularly Rock Around the Clock, which became a massive hit for Bill Haley and his Comets that same year and which spearheaded the rock-and-roll revolution in the mid-late 50s. The film also received acclaim for casting grown adults as high school teens, and for the unique breakout role of a black cast member, Sidney Poitier, as a rebellious yet musically talented student.
Blackboard Jungle was released on March 19, 1955 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Plot[]
"We, in the United States, are fortunate to have a school system that is a tribute to our communities and to our faith in American youth. Today we are concerned with juvenile delinquency-- it's causes-- and its effects. We are especially concerned when this delinquency boils over into our schools.
"The scenes and incidents depicted here are fictional. However, we believe that public awareness is a first step toward a remedy for any problem. It is in this spirit and with this faith that BLACKBOARD JUNGLE was produced."
(~Introductory text at the beginning of the movie)
In the mid-1950s, Richard Dadier is a new teacher at North Manual Trades High School, an inner-city school of diverse ethnic backgrounds. Led by student Gregory Miller, most of the students engage in anti-social behavior. The school principal, Mr. Warneke, denies there are discipline issues, but the school faculty, particularly Mr. Murdock, warn Dadier otherwise. Dadier befriends two other new teachers, Joshua Edwards and Lois Hammond.
Dadier's class includes Miller and Artie West, a rebellious bully and gang leader. Initially the class shows no respect for Dadier. Dadier encourages Miller to lead the class in the right direction. After Dadier subdues a student who attacks Hammond, the class gives Dadier the silent treatment and are even more uncooperative. Dadier and Edwards are mugged by West's gang.
Reluctant to quit, Dadier seeks advice from his former teacher, Professor Kraal, the principal of an academically superior school with disciplined students. Kraal offers Dadier a job, but he declines. After chastising his class for calling each other racially divisive names, Dadier is himself falsely accused by Warneke of using racial epithets in the classroom. When Dadier encounters West during his gang's robbery of a newspaper truck, West tells Dadier that he is in his classroom now and warns him not to interfere. Several students, led by West, assault Edwards in the classroom and destroy his music record collection.
Dadier's wife, Anne, who is pregnant, begins receiving anonymous letters and phone calls telling her Dadier and Miss Hammond are having an affair. Dadier discovers Miller can play piano and sing, and wonders why Miller can show such talent but also be so rebellious. Dadier shows his class an animated film about 'Jack and the Beanstalk' which sparks discussion about moral choices. Anne goes into premature labor caused by the stress of the phone calls about Dadier's alleged affair. When a neighbor shows Dadier the anonymous letters, he angrily decides to quit, but Murdock encourages him to stay, telling Dadier he is making progress and has inspired him too. Anne apologizes for doubting Dadier's fidelity and admits she was wrong for telling him to quit. Their newborn son, though weak from premature birth, eventually thrives.
When Dadier observes West openly copying from another student, he demands that West bring his paper to the front to have it docked five points. West rebuffs his repeated request, but Dadier is unrelenting. Their conflict quickly escalates, and West pulls out a switchblade. Belazi is about to jump Dadier from behind but he is stopped by Miller. Dadier continues to advance on West, undaunted even after West wounds him in his hand; seeing this, the rest of West's gang refuse to step in. After he accuses West of the false allegations made to both his wife and Warneke, Dadier is able to disarm him, and when Belazi grabs the knife off of the floor intending to make a run for it, Santini and the other students stop him while Morales grabs the knife and breaks the blade on a desk. Miller then leads the class in helping Dadier drag West and Belazi to the principal's office.
Epilogue[]
At the end of the day Dadier is about to head home when Miller catches up with him and mentions that he heard a rumor that he is quitting, though he doesn't believe it, mentioning that it would be a shame for Dadier to waste his newfound experience. He then remarks that both students and teachers learn something at school, and then adds that "it would be kinda rough breakin' in somebody new". Miller then asks if he'll see Dadier tomorrow; when Dadier replies that he thought Miller was quitting at the end of the year, Miller reminds him of the pact they made, and the two cordially part ways.
Cast[]
- Glenn Ford as Richard Dadier
- Sidney Poitier as Gregory Miller
- Vic Morrow as Artie West
- Anne Francis as Anne Dadier
- Louis Calhern as Jim Murdock
- Margaret Hayes as Lois Hammond
- John Hoyt as Mr. Warneke
- Richard Kiley as Joshua Edwards
- Emile Meyer as Mr. Halloran
- Warner Anderson as Dr. Bradley
- Basil Ruysdael as Professor A. R. Kraal
- Dan Terranova as Belazi
- Rafael Campos as Pete V. Morales
- Paul Mazursky as Emmanuel Stoker
- Horace McMahon as Detective
- Jameel Farah as Santini
Production Notes[]
The novel The Blackboard Jungle and the subsequent film were based on author Evan Hunter's experiences working as a teacher in New York City's tough South Bronx area.
The film marked the debut for several actors including:
- Rafael Campos, who would go on to have a 30-year career in TV westerns and several B-movies.
- Vic Morrow, whose acting career consisted mostly of TV roles, particularly that of Sgt. Chip Saunders in the 1962 TV series Combat!. Morrow would later lose his life in a helicopter accident during filming of Twilight Zone: The Movie in 1982.
- Jamie Farr, who was credited in the film as Jameel Farah, his real name. By the mid-1970s Farr would become a regular on the long-running TV series M*A*S*H playing cross-dressing crazy wannabe Max Klinger.
Rock Around the Clock[]
Director Richard Brooks decided to use contemporary recordings of popular music that best represented what young people of the day were listening to. Glenn Ford was inspired to borrow some of his son Peter's own records in an effort to get some ideas; one of them was Bill Haley and His Comets' version of the song Rock Around the Clock. The song was composed in 1952 by James Myers and Max Freedman, and was not initially intended as a rock-and-roll record; the original arrangement was very similar to Leroy Anderson's song The Syncopated Clock. Haley's recording, a harder-edged rockabilly arrangement, was originally released in 1954 as a B-side to Thirteen Women (And Only One Man In Town), the group's first single for Decca Records. Though this single made the Top 40, it was not considered a success.
Brooks' decision to use Rock Around the Clock in the film would prove to be a ground-breaking moment in popular music and mainstream pop culture. By the summer of 1955 the film and the song were so popular that Decca Records re-released Clock as an A-side single by that May. Two months later, Rock Around the Clock had soared to #1 on Billboard's "Best Sellers" chart where it stayed for eight consecutive weeks while topping the pop charts in other countries including the UK and Germany.
Though Rock Around the Clock is not the first rock-and-roll record, Haley's version of the song became the first ever rock-and-roll recording to top any national music survey anywhere in the world. Its inclusion in Blackboard Jungle led to its phenomenal success, making the song an anthem for the rebellious youth of the 1950s, and it is widely considered to be the song that spearheaded the worldwide rock-and-roll craze.
During the film's initial release, some movie theaters muted the song at the beginning; at the time, many still looked down on rock-and-roll music as a negative influence on youngsters. Despite this, other instances of the song in the film were not cut. The film's influence and the song's popularity was such that it was later used as the opening theme for George Lucas' 1973 film American Graffiti, and later still as the theme for the first two seasons of the hit ABC-TV sitcom Happy Days; its success in the latter made the song a Top 40 hit again when it was re-released as a single in the US in 1974, peaking at #39.
Controversy[]
Because of the movie's theme of juvenile delinquency and violence, Blackboard Jungle was initially rejected in other countries, but some of the scenes from the film were eventually cut out in those particular countries. In many European countries, the movie led to teenage violence in cinemas. When it shown at a South London Cinema in Elephant & Castle in 1956, the teenage Teddy Boy audience began rioting, tearing up seats and dancing in the aisles.
The film was also banned in some cities in the US, including Memphis, Tennessee and Atlanta, Georgia, with a review board in the latter claiming that the film was "immoral, obscene, licentious and will adversely affect the peace, health, morals and good order of the city".
Box Office[]
According to MGM box office records, Blackboard Jungle earned $5.3 million in the US and Canada, with an additional $2.9 million elsewhere, this on the film's budget of $1.168 million.
Accolades[]
1955 Academy Award Nominations
- "Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium" (to Richard Brooks)
- "Best Cinematography, Black-and-White" (to Russell Harlan)
- "Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White" (to Cedric Gibbons, Randall Duell, Edwin B. Willis & Henry Grace)
- "Best Film Editing" (to Ferris Webster)
Trailer[]
Blackboard Jungle 1955 trailer