Movie: (1957): Two hitchhiking sisters are sentenced to 30 days labor at a cotton farm run by a scheming, corrupt boss.
First shown: 1/27/90 (unconfirmed)
Opening: Joel explains the premise, again; Tom has a tape-worm
Invention exchange: Joel shows off the “never-light” pipe; the Mads have invented tongue puppets
Host segment 1: J&tB perform a pageant dedicated to Greg Brady
Host segment 2: Crow recalls when J&tB rigged up Cambot so they can see what Gypsy is thinking
Host segment 3: Gypsy’s sick, and Tom is no help
End: Joel tries to explain the goofy guy from the movie, and reads some letters
(130 votes, average: 4.34 out of 5)
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• The episode has some things going for it. The movie marks a real departure for the series: It’s the first non-horror/sci-fi movie of the national series. (In fact, all the movies in season one except this one would have fit easily within the restrictions Sci-Fi Channel initially imposed on the Brains.) Then there’s Mamie. All in all, it’s reasonably watchable, but the riffing is really only so-so and the host segments, like last week, seem to be either long marches to nowhere (segment 1) or disjointed messes (segment 3). If feel like it could have been better.
• References.
• This episode is included in Mystery Science Theater 3000: Vol. XXIX.
• Crow still has the thick chin twine.
• Tom Servo observes: “That’s the only torso I have.” That would not be true for long.
• Joel again tells the bots to “look downcast.”
• The bots wince in pain when Joel strikes a match on them. Nice touch. And Joel doesn’t seem to care! Why? Why were the bots created to feel pain?
• Born Joan Lucille Olander, you might remember Mamie’s appearance on the 1994 Turkey Day bumpers hosted by Adam West. You can read about her life in her autobiography “Playing the Field.” Mamie’s also very tech-savvy: You can visit mamievandoren.com, visit her Facebook page, visit her YouTube page or follow her on Twitter @mamievandoran. Mamie’s now semi-retired from film. But she’s still singing, and in 2010 she put an album called “Still a Troublemaker.”
• They may not have made a cotton picker out of him, but Tom’s wrong: they WERE able to make a singer out of him. That’s rockabilly star Eddie Cochran, playing a character named “Bong” (it was a simpler time). He was only 19 here, but sadly only a couple of years away from his death in a car crash at the age of 21. (Cochran holds the dubious distinction of being the youngest person to die in our MSTory database.)
• “Untamed Youth” was condemned by the Catholic Legion of Decency, but reportedly it only increased the film’s popularity.
• You can definitely see the blue tinting in this one.
• Strange line from the movie: “I’ll give ya an Italian haircut.” Several commenters say it means slitting a person’s throat.
• There was a certain type of MST3K fan who, when you asked them why they liked the show, would say something like “because that guy Joel was SO HIGH.” Why that would be a positive attribute of a TV show escapes me, but that’s just me. At an appearance more recently, Joel stated categorically that he was never stoned while shooting MST3K but, I gotta say, in host segment 1, he sure LOOKS it. I’m going to attribute it to Joel’s acting skills.
• Joel also almost falls over as the segment starts (though, to be fair, there was only a very small platform behind the desk for the host to stand on–the rest was an open trench where the puppeteers stood; I once stood there, and I can attest to the fact that it would be very easy for even a completely sober person to accidentally misstep and almost fall).
• I was never that much of a “Brady Bunch” fan, so I don’t really get why the detailed minutiae about the show they spout in segment 1 is funny. These season one “pageants” don’t really stand up well to repeat viewings.
• I wonder why they added the flashback element to host segment 2. Doesn’t seem necessary and certainly doesn’t add anything. To add time?
• LOTR reference: “Sauron’s dark army?”
• Callback: “No dancing.” (Crawling Hand); SPACOM! (Project Moonbase).
• We get several more uses of “Wonder what (s)he wanted…”
• Gypsy enters the theater for the first time (not counting KTMA) in this episode: Joel calls her into the theater to produce cotton in response to Tom Servo’s query (apropos of NOTHING, by the way) about what real cotton feels like (though how exactly Tom Servo would “feel” the cotton is unclear–I know, it’s just a show). Joel tells her to use her “teledyne vector” to perform this function, whatever that is.
• Gypsy’s lips fall off during a very hectic segment 3. They keep going. Then when she spits out a new Tom Servo, there’s no hand on his left arm. Either it wasn’t there to begin with, or it fell off during the fall. They keep going.
• While we’re more used to Joel stumbling over his lines, in the last half hour in the theater, Trace commits a doozy of a line flub with: “Hey, it’s Grg-brg-grg-Greg Brady!” They keep going.
• With this episode, the MST3K “Fan Club” becomes the “Information Club” in the end-of-show announcement.
• I think a brief explanation of the final musical number is called for: It feels shoehorned in, because it is. In 1957 (as this movie was being made) Harry Belafonte scored a HUGE hit with “The Banana Boat Song.” The song was mostly a hit because of its different sound and of course Harry’s charming singing style. But music promoters, as music promoters so often do, completely misread the public and decided that what the teeners wanted was calypso, calypso and MORE calypso. They didn’t, and the whole fad folded in a matter of weeks, but not before Les Baxter threw a little calypso number into this movie. (Also THIS travesty got made. Needs to be seen to be believed.)
• Stinger suggestion: Goofy guy dancing.
• Cast and crew roundup: This week they’re all in front of the camera. Lori Nelson was also in “Revenge of the Creature.” Lurene Tuttle wqas also in “Parts: The Clonus Horror. Yvonne Lime was also in “I Was A Teenage Werewolf. Robert Foulk was also in “The Indestructible Man.” Michael Emmet was also in “Attack of the Giant Leeches” and “Night of the Blood Beast.” And, of course, Mamie was also in “Girls Town.”
• CreditsWatch: Additional production assistants, again, were Melanie Hartley and Neil Brede; and the additional production staff was Jim Erickson. Audio post production was, again, by IVL Post in Minneapolis.
• Favorite riff: “Wait…so you’re my grandma, my sister, my mom … did you marry Bill Wyman?” Honorable mention: “And who are all these guys on the floor?”
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I’m going to echo Sampo’s sentiment that the watchability of this film in conjunction with solid riffing makes this among the very best season 1 experiment. But I’ve always liked this rebellious youth type films.
You know they really missed out on a great catch phrase here. Just as we were coming to enjoy the unison “Thank you” from the Mads when Joel complimented them on their evil inventions they start messing with it. This week the unison part was gone as they shook each other’s hands. But I suppose, that dynamic only has one episode left now anyway.
Is it just me or is the blue tint to the black and white especially noticeable this week? (FYI: I’m watching a Cheepnis copy of this experiment.)
Really movie? Was the cast expected to wear their own cloths on camera? Could no one afford to get the judge at the beginning an actual black robe?
We have a Spacom callback.
Favorite Riffs:
Tom while admiring the girl’s legs: Nice lever action, check out the fulcrum.
Crow after seeing the combine: Hey he’s driving the Swamp from MASH.
Outside of the riffing I love this film for two big reasons.
Sampo, I’m probably wrong but I think “Italian Haircut” references slitting someone’s throat.
Strictly in terms of plot and performances, this is one of the best made movies to yet appear on MST, and one of the sexiest they ever did. It is also the first of a handful from the “juvenile delinquent” genre that will a be seen over the next few years, until the Sci-Fi Channel put an end to that practice. Too bad, because the Brains really excelled at riffing these overheated melodramas, letting loose with some of their bluest material.
• Joel: SAY, she IS friendly.
• Joel: You know, it really makes me miss the potato and cotton fields of Earth. (callback)
Crow: Hey, it’s Blond Lemon Jefferson, hee hee hee.
• “You got a little something up there” also gets a reprise.
• Jane: Thanks Bob… you’re real gone.
Crow: Well, thanks, I’m no expert, but I, …pretty sure I’m still here.
• The miscarriage and death of “Baby” is a tragedy that comes out of nowhere…
Joel: Gee, I’m sorry we even made fun of this movie.
• Judge Tropp: I was hoping you and Russ would hit it off.
Servo: Well he did punch me once.
• Crow: Wait a minute, these are stills from Yards of Leather. (another callback)
Exotica/lounge music maestro Les Baxter is credited with the soundtrack, but I don’t really hear that much of his signature sweet melodic sounds here beyond the catchy, though lyrically insipid, songs. You can easily find Mamie’s final number, “Go Go Calypso” on the Capitol CD compilation Divas Exotica. Her others are more rare but did get released on an LP/CD titled The Girl Who Invented Rock ‘n’ Roll (I’m listening to it now and her singing is pretty terrible. The recordings are also different than the ones used in the movie, though they date from the same period). The Eddie Cochran song “Cottonpicker” is out there also, somewhere.
After a bit of photo research for my blog I found that co-star Jeanne Carmen (Lillibet, the cat-fighting former housemaid) was also a cheesecake model back in the day. Shortly before her death in 2007 she dished about Marilyn, Elvis, the Kennedy’s, Sinatra, and the mob in her biography My Wild, Wild Life.
5 stars. Decently indecent movie with some ribald riffing, and begging for DVD release. You know, for the lighting…
Sampo,
They also managed to get Bop Girl Goes Calypso out before it all went away. At least that one has the very talented Lord Flea!
One word……Mamie…..need I say more?
For me this is the most watchable of the “troubled teens/juvenile delinquent” themed movies they did. The others all get successively more depressing and aggravating and are hard to even watch. This one is light enough and silly enough much of the time not to get too bogged down emotionally for the viewer as some of the later ones do. Pretty funny, though I prefer just most other season one shows for repeated, frequent viewing.
Censors were shocked at the blatant carnality of the
bathing scene in the pond! You could see clear up to their
ankles! :shock:
ah, the good old days, where the very thought of a hint of the possibility, that she was probably in a state of undress under water could send mothers to clutching their skirts and fathers to the bathroom. The magical Fifties.
I remember Josh saying once this was actually his favorite episode. Gee, I wonder why?
I love that shot during the dance where the guy lifts the girl over his head, her skirt drops, revealing her panties, and J&TB just howl.
Anyway, here’s my review:
112- Untamed Youth.
Plot: Two women are arrested for swimming in a pond naked (which could possibly mean the sheriff is very overtly strict, or very gay), and are sentenced to 30 days of hard labor. Stars Mamie Van Doren
Host Segments:
Opening: Servo needs to be fixed. Joel finds a magnetic tapeworm inside of him.
Invention Exchange: The Never-Light Pipe; Toung puppets.
Segment #1: A tribute to Greg Brady.
Segment #2: Crow recalls an incident when Gypsy’s nervous system shut down. They look to see what’s inside her brain. A picture of Richard basehart and some ram chips.
Segment #3: Gypsy is sick from producing so much cotton
Closing: J&TB discuss the goofy, nerdy guy in the movie. Then they read letters.
Memorable riffs:
Joel: “Thought you could hide behind the credits, eh?”
Character in movie: “Hi, Mitch! Whatch doin? Fishin?”
Crow: “No, just sexually harassing a few teens.”
Crow: “I don’t know what he expects from them, they’re untamed!”
Crow: “Elvis has left the cotton field!”
Servo: “That phone doesn’t look like it was made for a human head.”
Guy in movie: “What’s the matter Jenny?”
Crow: “I’m in prison!”
Mamie: “I thought Abe Lincoln had gotten rid of slavery.”
Crow: “Yeah, he’s right over there workin on it.”
Servo: “That little punk hit me with a Nurf ball!”
Fav. Riff:
Servo: “Well, I pulled her teeth, is that what you wanted?”
Comments:
-Joel almost falls over as the first host segment starts.
-When one of the cotton-pickers drops a bag over Mamie’s head, Servo shouts out something that SOUNDS like, “Eegah! Down!” He’s probably saying, “Igor down”, but it honests sounds like he’s saying “Eegah.” Is it possible that the movie Eegah was screened during season 1, but rejected until season 5? Unlikely I suppose, but who knows?
-During segment 2, Joel refers to Gypsy as a computer, rather than a robot. Mistake or intentional? You decide.
-Kevin Murphy makes a good observation about Segment 2 in the ACEG book. Why the [bleep] did that segment have to be a flashback in the first place?!
-Someone explain something to me. Is the guy in this movie DOING his own mother? I don’t get it. It’s very creepy.
-Gotta love Crow’s Don Knott’s impression.
-Gypsy makes her first appearence in the theater. She enters rather quickly after Joel calls her in. She must hang around near the theater often.
-Joel makes a weird comment in the closing segment. That Crow and Servo can’t wear glasses because they don’t have eyes to speak of. Um…. okay, Servo doesn’t have any visible eyes, but Crow certainly does. The point of that comment is lost on me.
Best Segment: The cotton segment is okay, I guess.
Worst segment: The Greg Brady tribute is VERY BORING, and not entertaining in the least.
Overall: Another average episode, but still pretty good compared to earlier season 1 shows. It’s also nice to finally see a movie that isn’t science fiction. The movie is also okay on it’s own, and the riffing just adds a little extra. So this is definetly one of the better season 1 shows.
Rating: ***
#2
yeah I was thinking the same thing…’the Italian haircut’ referring to a mob-style hit
Trace has had a worse line flub than “Grg-brg-Greg Brady”. Remember “You know, this fl-fb-uh-thk-flh…” from “Invasion USA”? I still have no idea what that line was supposed to be.
So, were nightly sock hops standard procedure for the justice system during that era? Seems like if they weren’t feeding the kids dog food, the county work farm would be a pretty fun place.
I wonder if there’s any chance Shout Factory could make a future box set an all-JD movie collection, with this, “Girls’ Town”, “High School Big Shot” and “I Was a Teenage Werewolf”. The rights issues would be a major hassle, but it’d be worth it.
Brandon @ #9
“Someone explain something to me. Is the guy in this movie DOING his own mother? I don’t get it. It’s very creepy.”
No, the son is interested in Lori Nelson; the mother is secretly married to the ranch-owner, Mr.Tropp.
Well, the idea that an ‘Italian haircut’ refers to slitting someone’s throat has been covered (like everyone else, I’m just guessing), and someone mentioned Bop Girl Goes Calypso. So much for my contributions. But I will point out that this is another episode I enjoy for the sake of the movie. It’s terrible, of course, but fun. I think that’s mostly because this type of episode provides such irresistibly dated glimpses of youth culture. Except, of course, that they’re actually glimpses of what middle-aged men decided would pass for youth culture.
I think my favorite aspect of the movie is the kids’ admiration for the cook. The guy is literally serving them dog food (uh, spoiler?), but if Hollywood has taught us anything, it’s that juvenile delinquents are hugely impressed by a fine vocabulary.
Another from the first season I’d class as not great but not bad either. The riffing was ok but as I’ve mentioned with other so-so efforts of this season I think they could’ve done a better job had they revisited this one in their later seasons. It’s a cheesy yet still watchable flick, certainly as one reader noted probably the best of the “juvie” films they riffed on, and I liked the Greg Brady skit, and of course, the young Mamie Van Doren is always pleasing on the eyes (though her singing voice wasn’t, but that’s just me). Interesting that the late, great Eddie Cochran not only appeared but contributed some tunes to this film though I daresay had he lived this wouldn’t have stood as one of his more memorable efforts. Three stars out of five.
I’m with Sampo on this one, I had good memories of this one, but the riffing is slightly off and the Host Segments do not work. The presence of Mamie does give this one a boost though.
HS#1, the Greg Brady tribute, is reminiscent of sketches from later seasons, but not as tightly written.
I was daydreaming while watching HS#2.
In HS#3, when Gypsy is sick, Joel yells at Tom, like REALLY yells at him. Then Gypsy throws up a Tom Servo double. The birth of extra Servos?!??
Has anyone else noticed that the Mads both have ponytails? Man, the early nineties where lame.
Riffs:
Joel: “I understand you ladies are untamed.”
Joel: “Wait a minute, this is a bag of rayon!”
Crow: “Wait a sec, these are stills from Yards of Leather!”
Crow: “David Byrne’s new band!”
All three of them sing a bit of “The Weiner Man” song at one point.
Joel sure is lonely in space. I think towards the end of the experiment he checks out Greg Brady.
Finally, just like Joel, I wonder what “come on boys, carry my banannas!” means exactly.
Good Season One episode, not great.
!
@12 I’d like to see a box set like that,too,but you forgot Teen-Age Crime Wave..This is a movie I wished they would’ve redone later.
I love this movie, so much so that I tracked down an un-MST’d copy at an online retailer and bought it.
Yes, the bits still have that what-the-heck-are-we-doing feel of the KTMAs and Season Ones but I really enjoy the riffing.
Mamie has NO idea how to sing rock’n’roll, does she? She’s so obviously a Vegas-y Rat Pack-y big band kind of gal.
And life imitated art 2 years ago in Pennsylvania where, “Several hundred families have filed a class-action lawsuit against two former judges who have pleaded guilty to taking bribes in return for placing youths in privately owned jails. Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan are said to have received $2.6 million for ensuring juvenile suspects were jailed in prisons operated by the companies PA Child Care and a sister company, Western PA Child Care.”
How weird & creepy is that?
Well, that formatting didn’t work right. Sampo, Erhardt, could you just delete that post , please?
From an interview I came across (http://www.bartcop.com/mamie-van-doren-interview.htm):
“Elvis came to see me at the Rivera hotel in Las Vegas. He had just seen me in … Untamed Youth. My gowns were all see-through with back lighting onstage. Sitting with him alone in his Caddy one night, he asked me if I wore anything under my gowns. When I said no, he pounded the steering wheel, ‘I knew you didn’t! I knew it!’ That turned him on.”
…not that any of you were wondering. *ahem*
I know it’s a stage name she took from Mamie Eisenhower, but it fascinates me that the name Mamie was famously connected to two such polar opposites in the ’50s. Imagine if the President’s wife had been, I dunno, Britney Clinton or Madonna Reagan. Beyonce Obama? :laugh:
I really don’t get Mamie’s “appeal.” But then, her looks are supposed to distract you from her complete, and utter, lack of acting ability. Not really a good thing in my good.
In addition to seeing Lori Nelson again in Revenge of the Creature, we also get Yvonne Fedderson (Baby, who died) as Michael Landon’s girlfriend in I Was a Teenage Werewolf, and Lurene Tuttle (the judge) as the little old lady who gets blown up in Parts: The Clonus Horror.
Two reasons to love this movie- Mamie
Neither horror or sci fi, I guess you can say that this is their first ‘mystery’ flick. Not a bad film on its own and the riffing, and Mamie, make this a good popcorn movie for Saturday night.
“Italian Haircut” I believe means to have one’s hair torn out from their roots. I am Italian and grew up in Brooklyn in the 1950s. I have heard the expression then and this was the explanation I got.
“I’ll give ya an Italian haircut,” is an allusion to slitting someone’s throat with a straight razor, although other types of edged weapons will work as well.
Randy
I really enjoy this film in both the MST3K and unriffed forms. Fifties juvenile delinquent films seem so quaint by today’s standards that they make for perfect comedy fare.
I’m going a little off subject here, but if you’re a fan of Untamed Youth, Mamie Van Doren or Juvenile Delinquent films in general, then you owe it to yourself to see High School Confidential. In this one Mamie is young Russ Tamblin’s oversexed aunt. The film is loaded with corny and dated drug references like “I’m looking to graze on some grass.” Jackie Coogan is the baddest of bad guys as a pusher. Jerry Lee Lewis performs from the back of a truck. There’s even a priceless reading of “beat” poetry. It’s just one of those films that just gets funnier every time you watch it.
#11: I was going to mention that line flub also. Thanks for reminding me what episode it came from.
What do you mean calypso’s dead? It never left! Just kidding of course but the calypso sequence is pretty awesome with or without riffs. I like this one. The movie’s good and so are the host segments. Mamie’s fun and I don’t care that they talked over Eddie Cochran’s only song.
Glad to see Mamie’s still going after all these years. This is a fun episode, not a classic (or even in my top 5 of season 1) but a lot of fun. And not a terrible film, that’s for sure. If Shout ever gets the rights to this or Girl’s Town, I hope they can track down Mamie for an interview. Part of her appeal is that she seems to speak her mind and have a lot of affection for these B movies.
Fart Bargo’s right – “Italian haircut” is something you could expect to see in a “cat fight”. Apparently it’s customary for women to fight by tearing out each other’s hair, in addition to such things as scratching with their nails and kickinng one in the – well, you get the picture.
I’m with Dr. Chad and Fart re. “Italian haircut” being hair-pulling.
I think people are mistaking it for the Colombian necktie which Wikipedia defines as “a method of execution where the victim’s throat is slashed (with a knife or other sharp object) and their tongue is pulled out through the open wound.” Sounds painful…
This and Girls Town are both among my favorite episodes. Like others, some of my favorites are the teenage delinquent episodes. I can throw one of those on any time and enjoy it. This is easily my favorite Season One episode. A box set with this, Girls Town and the 94 TD bits sounds like a natural. This is the infamous episode where Trace and Josh were drunk while taping, in an attempt to see if it helped their riffing (I can’t tell a difference). And yes, this is the flick where they talked over the only Dick Contino- er I mean Eddie Cochran song in the whole movie. The theater segments of this episode foreshadow the excellence yet to come, as these theater segments could easily be mistaken for a season two or three. The host segments still retain the unique charm of season one host segs. Watching it again right now, and yeah, Italian Haircut has to mean hair pulling, due to the context of the scene. They’re just beating each other up, no knifing. Along with Mamie, Eddie Cochran is another legend. Due yourself a favor and look a little deeper into his all too short career. He was one of those awesome early rockers, like Buddy Holly, to whom we owe the existence of The Beatles and everyone else who came after, actually. Even Sid Vicious was into the guy. The song he performs in this movie, however, is as cheesy as all the other songs in this movie, but fun. Ah, the Greg Brady skit. They thought that one woman from the movie looked like Greg Brady; the rest of the skit is another result of these guys watching way too much of the only three channels we had at the time, just like the rest of us. Great, great episode. Next week’s is pretty good too. If you liked this movie, seek out Go, Johnny, Go! It features the only onscreen appearance of Ritchie Valens, and is like a non-violent The Beatniks. I killed that fat barkeep! (and I ate all the Fruzen Glazen)
This is my second favorite experiment from season 1 (Behind Project Moonbase). It still holds up well for me after all these years. The riffing is often cute and clever (the Claude Rains line to name one) and I enjoyed the skits a bunch.
@29,
That may be the way SOME women fight, but I don’t do that. I don’t get into fights, but I’ll punch the crap out of some woman and probably more painful tactics rather than resort to mere hair-pulling and nail scratching.
I can second kbrubaker’s recommendation of High School Confidential. A really weird combination of MGM gloss and Albert Zugsmith patented sleaze that never quite gelled in any of the movies he made for the studio but which gives all his films for them a unique feel.
Mamie is at her sexiest in a very strange roll (Is she Tamblyn’s aunt? Isn’t she? It’s really never made clear.) You get Drew Barrymore’s dad, John Drew Barrymore, doing a really lame imitation of Lord Buckley-style jazz poetry when he tries to tell the story of Columbus in “jive.” Obviously based on Buckley’s famous retelling of the life of Jesus as the Nazz, it has absolutely none of Buckley’s subversive point or his musicality and it just lays there, flat as a board.
And as always in these movies, marijuana leads straight to heroin! It never fails! https://www.mst3kinfo.com/wp-content/plugins/tango-smileys-extended/tango/devil.png
I totally agree with anyone who says those “pageants” are LAME. They are among the very few MST3K moments that I invariable FFWD through.
I also noticed the erudite, beloved, camp cook, who we learn is feeding the kids DOG FOOD. Are we supposed to still like him after that?
You know what I like best (almost)? The dancing! Yes! I really dig the Hollywood Rock ‘n’ Rollers. I seriously wish I could dance like that. Even attempting it, with my shades drawn so no one can see, makes my floors go all wiggly and lamps and stuff start moving around. So I can never give it a decent shot.
Lori Nelson as Mamie’s sister was, for me, unrecognizable as the same woman who played the pretty ichthyologist in “Revenge of the Creature.” She sounds the same but I am amazed at how a different hairstyle changes her look.
I love “Untamed Youth.”
– (Mouseketeer roll call: )
“Cubby!…GREGOR…Annette!…Hoppy!…Mabel…Mabel…and, Mabel.”
– “KP duty? I thought Lincoln freed the slaves!”
Crow: “No, he’s right over there: ”
(beatnik) “Yeah, free the slaves, cool, man…”
– “Won’t someone help me carry my bananas!”
Joel: “I have…NO IDEA…what that is supposed to mean.”
Man am I the only one who doesn’t think Mamie Van Doren was anything all the special? Then again I also have never been able to see what the big deal is about Marilyn Monroe. She’s so far from being the most beautiful woman ever that it isn’t even funny. I’m more a fan of women like Lillian Gish, Fay Wray, or the absolute bestest almighty goddess most beautiful woman of all time Louise Brooks. But even for contemporaries of Mamie Van Doren I could list off a hundred other women I would place above her on my list. I could probably find more than enough in movies they did on MST did alone.
Anyway as for Untamed Youth it’s an alright episode. The movie isn’t anything special to me, but the riffing is okay. The host segments aren’t horrible, but they are forgettable. Overall I’d say it’s MUCH better than something like “Robot vs. The Aztec Mummy” but not in the same league as episodes like “Robot Holocaust” or “Moon Zero Two”. It’s nice as an early attempt at a 1950’s youth culture type movie, but they far surpassed this so many times later on in both riffing and the choice of the movies themselves, so it doesn’t stand out to me as anything but “first”.
Soylent Green is made of dog food!
Just what was so “untamed” about this youth? They didn’t really do anything to warrant that monicle.
Not too many memorable moments in this for me. I just watched it two nights ago and I can’t really think of anything to write home about.
So, I guess…um…nevermind.
Do you mean “moniker” ?
Plenty to “write home about” here – one of the finest Season One episodes.
I remembered this as being one of the better season 1 episodes and rewatched this a couple of nights ago for probably the first time in 15 years. I hadn’t seen a Joel era episode in a while since I have finally been catching up on the Sci-Fi shows I ignored back when they were first on and was shocked at how unfunny the host segments were but the riffing was OK except I think it talked over the movie too much. It’s an entertainingly bad movie though and a little Mamie goes a long way to making this one a decent episode, one of the few season 1 episodes I would rewatch.
Man, I was waiting for someone to slap Eddie Cochran when he was bouncing around like a hyped-up six year old in their initial lineup. I know that he was supposed to be this cool hepcat who wasn’t down with this scene, you dig, Daddy-o? He’s just so rockin’ and boppin’ deep in his soul that he constantly has to move to his internal rhythm. But instead he just came across as a giant spaz.
This is one of my fave season one episodes. I remember seeing part of it [in what was probably the last airing] on Comedy Central, but I first got to see all of it at ConventioCon II. It was there that I heard my fave line from the episode:
Tropp: “I’ll have a monopoly.”
Crow: “Boardwalk, Park Place, think of it! And I’m using the shoe.”
For most people, that’s probably just a stock Monopoly riff. But for me, it’s unconnected nostalgia. In our house, no matter who was playing, the shoe was worthless. Anyone playing with the shoe was guaranteed to go bankrupt first, and usually spend long stretches in Jail. Coincidence, I love thee.
I’d love to see this one get released on DVD. God bless Cheepnis for what he has (as do I), but it’d be great to see a better print.
#40: Yes. :)
I think that this is one of the best (if not the best) episode from Season One.
Good movie to riff on and good riffs.
What I love about this film is that it is a Warner Brothers Release.
Here is a studio making “Gone with the Wind” and, by this time, Cinemascope “sand and sandal” movies and musicals,
and then they slap their name on THIS.
I can see the meeting now . . .
“You know JR, there is a lot of money to be made with these “teens in trouble” flixs.
They cost next to nothing and the kids seem to eat them up.
We could pad the bottom line and show that WB is really a hip and happening kinda studio.”
Then the fat guy chewing on a cigar says, “Just make sure its not too expensive.
I’m looking to make a fortune on that Cleopatra film with Liz. THAT is where the real money is.”
I am not sure why WB did not just launch a “Touchstone” sort of thing to rake in the cash but maintain their “respectability.”
This is another one of those old films in which the youth are mostly approaching their thirties. Except for Eddie Cochran. I wonder how he felt about the film? This was just before he had a big hit with “Summertime Blues”, and he really wasn’t anybody at the time, but in hindsight it seems deeply perverse that the only film where he was a credited performer is dominated by Mamie Van Doren. He’s just a footnote. Somewhere in the universe there’s a planet where The Giant Gila Monster had Buddy Holly in it – not as the “sing whatever I sing” character, but his non-singing best friend.
Cochran died in Chippenham, which is about thirty miles from where I live. The car also had Gene Vincent in it, and was driven by George Martin! But not *the* George Martin. His guitar ended up in the hands of local policeman Dave Dee, who founded Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick, and Titch, a band that was huge in the UK but made no impact at all in the USA. The people of Wiltshire still speak of this, because it is one of the county’s three brushes with rock’n’roll. As a British person I have no idea who the hell Greg Brady is or was, so half of the jokes fly over my head.
Mamie. I’d never heard of her until MST3K. She’s a game lass, rubbish but likeable. I think she’s sexier in Girl’s Town, although that could be because I’m watching the same digital copy as #1 (the movie is a blue, blurry mess). The songs she sings are awful and she sings them badly but it’s hard to dislike her. Conceptually she appears to be a 1950s version of Anna Nicole Smith, except that the details are all different; she appears to be self-aware and independent, rather than oblivious and surrounded by parasites. Perhaps there were fewer drugs around in those days. She seems like the kind of person who would actually attend the Razzies to pick up her own award. It’s a shame MST3K never did The Navy Versus the Night Monsters. Looking at her page on the IMDB it seems that MST3K could have devoted all of season two to Mamie Van Doren films.
Her entire filmography is a mountain of cheese – it would probably be very entertaining to have a Mamie Van Doren DVD drinks party, in which the goal is to watch all of Mamie Van Doren’s films and then pass out drunk. I suspect that, if Mamie Van Doren participated, she would be the last one to pass out.
As for the film, it’s sort of decent. Fairly pacy, professionally made, and would benefit from a modern remake (either straight, or as a John Waters-esque parody). The theme of exploiting migrant workers hasn’t dated. The death of poor Baby is unusually bleak (both the fact of her dying, and dying of a miscarriage). Overall it reminds me of The Girl in Gold Boots – the basic plot is similar, but Untamed Youth has a huge diversion in the middle. I’m sure I remember reading somewhere the dog food is actually more expensive than cheap beef stew, because it has to be made to a certain standard; I could be wrong.
I still have nightmares about J Elvis Weinstein’s “tongue puppet” segment. That one shot of him… with the puppet… his huge face! His huge face. Not helped by the fact that my copy blends his black hair and black coat into the background, so the only thing on the screen is his face. His disembodied, dis-cranialised face. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with his face – I’ve seen worse, I used to live in London – it’s the fact that it doesn’t look connected to his body. Body parts stop being attractive when they’re no longer connected to the rest of the body. The Tongue Puppets would be a good name for a Clive Barker short story.
I notice that Frank Miller was the set decorator. From that to The Dark Knight Returns in just thirty years. And then he blew it. Still, it’s good to have a trade to fall back on.
“Two reasons to love this movie- Mamie”
Arf. What was it with pointy bras? By which I mean the pointy-pointy, obviously artificial triangular type. What did people in the 1950s think about them? Was it an attempt to nullify the power of breasts by turning them into something mechanical, like a space capsule? Were they a consequence of immature bra technology? I mean, the men aren’t going around with huge leather codpieces, why did the women have huge pointy bras? Why?
Also, Jane Russell wasn’t attractive at all. She didn’t even have a big bust. I’ve said it, there.
In August of 2011 I went to Canada. I was meeting in person for the first time my future spouse. We were going on a 3+ week road-trip through the Atlantic Provinces, so my Rav4 rental car was packed full.
The border crossing experience could have been better. They decided to inspect my vehicle. My future spouse’s grandmother liked true crime stories, so I was bringing a couple of those. One of them was titled something like The Smiling Killer, and the border guards were not amused.
I had a couple dozen episodes of MST3K with me. In 2008 I had purchased a complete set of the episodes that had not been officially released on DVD yet with 300 bucks I got from the “Economic Stimulus Act.” The guy who made the DVDs for me put them in plain white sleeves. The discs had no markings. I had printed some labels to put on the sleeves.
I was waiting inside the border patrol station while 3-4 of Canada’s most eager border agents went through that car. About 15 minutes later one of them comes inside and says, “I’m just gonna ask you straight, what is THIS?”
He was holding up the sleeve with the sticker that said 112: Untamed Youth.
I think you can think what he was thinking.
Well they let me in anyway.
We had our two year anniversary on New Year’s Eve.
I do love this movie.
Those border crossings make we want to go pound corn liquor.
Maternal or paternal grandmother?
Neither relevant nor any of my business, of course, it just caught my attention because very few films and TV shows acknowledge that everyone has or had (at least) TWO sets of grandparents, and even in real life, some people don’t clarify the point in conversation.
(Also I can’t think of anything to say about the actual episode right now.)
Untamed Youth passes the Bechdel Test. There are multiple non-male conversations between the various female inmates as well as with the judge.
For a stinger, I’d go with the cat fight.
The first of what I personally label as the Sordid Crime movies. These are not among my favorites and, with a couple of exceptions (specifically I Accuse My Parents and Mitchell), I really struggle to get through them.
One good thing I can say about it though concerns one of the captions on the back of the DVD slipcase. I speak of the one that goes, “See! Innocent girls arrested for having no visible means of support!”, accompanied by a screen capture of when Penny and Janey are caught skinny dipping by the sheriff.
I too will admit that I’d never guess that Janey was portrayed by the same actress as Helen from Revenge of the Creature. It’s amazing how a different hairstyle can make a person unrecognizable.
Favorite riffs
He’s playing football against Claude Rains University.
After him! He’s hiding behind those credits.
There’s no room for our stuff. The back seat’s filled with a jazz combo.
“You take that back or take a beating.”
Take the beating!
Man, that kid sure looks good on that combine. Put some spurs on him, make him sing show tunes, he’ll fit in real fine.
“I thought I’d catch you with another man.”
oh, they left hours ago.
That’s the problem with today’s youth. This is how their image of prison is.
If only beatniks had stuck with pumpkin pie.
maternal