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| Christian Doermer and Horst Buchholz |
Freddy (Horst Buchholz, herein billed as "Henry Bookholt") is a handsome, callous, criminally-inclined young man with a 15-year-old girlfriend, Sissi (Karin Baal), who may be worse than he is. His brother, John (Christian Doermer), is a much more decent lad who, unfortunately, looks up to his brother, who has left home. Freddy enlists some of his friends in an armed robbery that doesn't quite go as he intended, and disaster strikes when Freddy and Sissi break into a restaurant owner's home and John goes after them. Teenage Wolfpack is a dubbed American version of a German film that was clearly influenced by U.S. juvenile delinquent movies, and is hardly any better than most of those. Buchholz [That Man in Istanbul] struts around in tight leather pants, dances a blue streak in a jukebox sequence (probably influenced by Elvis), and exhibits the charisma that turned him, briefly, into an international star. Baal and Doermer are also effective, but the movie's dramatics are unconvincing, and despite the action the film becomes tedious. Nevertheless, some people see this as a West German classic. Not me.
Verdict: I Was a Teenage Frankenstein is more entertaining. **.
Might be worth a look, though, Bill, thanks for writing about this one. The Establishment were very afraid that rock-n-roll would change all their kids to hip-swiveling, sex-hungry, interracial-dancing werewolves or something! LOL
ReplyDeleteYou've nailed how some people felt about rock and roll back in the day!
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