This overwrought domestic drama is based on the last 80 pages of John Steinbeck’s novel, set in Salinas, 1917. Cal Trask’s forlorn attempts to win the affection of his self-righteous father (Raymond Massey) represented James Dean’s first leading role in the cinema, and his emotionally raw performance ennobled misunderstood youth everywhere. Julie Harris was top-billed as Abra, the girl who comes between Cal and his brother, Aron.
Writing to Steinbeck, Kazan told him: “I looked thru a lot of kids before settling on this Jimmy Dean. He hasn’t Brando’s stature, but he’s a good deal younger and is very interesting, has balls and eccentricity and a “real problem” somewhere in his guts, I don’t know what or where. He’s a little bit of a bum, but he’s a real good actor and I think he’s the best of a poor field. Most kids who become actors at nineteen or twenty or twenty-one are very callow and strictly from NY Professional school. Dean has got a real mean streak and a real sweet streak. Dean has the advantage of never having been seen on the screen.”
The young actor died in an auto accident two months after the film was released, with two more films in the can: Giant and Rebel Without a Cause.
An amazingly high-strung, feverishly poetic movie about Cain and Abel as American brothers… Dean seems to go just about as far as anybody can in acting misunderstood.
Pauline Kael
Elia Kazan
James Dean, Julie Harris, Raymond Massey, Jo Van Fleet
USA
1955
English
Best Supporting Actress (Jo Van Fleet), Academy Awards
Open to youth!
$10 youth tickets available
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits
Screenwriter
Paul Osborn
Cinematography
Ted D. McCord
Editor
Owen Marks
Original Music
Leonard Rosenman
Also in This Series
Getting Real charts the evolution of screen acting in American film from 1945-1980, diving into the psychological realism which took audiences somewhere deeper and more authentic than ever before.
The Heiress
Olivia de Havilland won the Oscar for playing Catherine, a shy and insecure young woman who blossoms under the courtship of handsome gentleman caller Morris (Montgomery Clift). Her wealthy father, Ralph Richardson, looks on with severe skepticism.
A Place in the Sun
George (Montgomery Clift) takes a job in his uncle's firm. But before he can break into the family's charmed inner circle and fall in love with socialite Angela (Elizabeth Taylor), he becomes embroiled with a factory girl (Shelley Winters).
A Streetcar Named Desire
"I don't want realism. I want magic!" declares Blanche du Bois, the tragic heroine who meets her nemesis in her sister's husband, Stanley Kowalski, in Tennessee Williams' great play. Brando's performance as Stanley is a turning point in American acting.
On the Waterfront
Marlon Brando's definitive performance as Terry Malloy, a New York dockworker (and once a promising boxer) who loses faith in his union and his smarter but corrupt older brother Charlie (Rod Steiger) after a whistleblower is murdered.
East of Eden
Salinas, 1917. Cal Trask's forlorn attempts to win the affection of his self-righteous father (Raymond Massey) represented James Dean's first leading role in the cinema, and his emotionally raw performance ennobled misunderstood youth everywhere.
Rebel Without a Cause
Kids turned bad in the 1950s -- and their newly comfortable middle-class parents couldn't understand why. Ray points the finger right back at them: "You're tearing me apart!" rails Jim Stark (James Dean), speaking for his generation.
Giant
This was the Yellowstone of its time: a big, sweeping modern Western built around an imposing ranch and family dynamics -- except Giant is much more subversive. James Dean strikes it rich as Jett Rink, much to the disgust of his former boss, Rock Hudson.
The Fugitive Kind
Sidney Lumet's movie brings together two of the greatest actors of the period, Brando and Anna Magnani, reason enough to check out this underrated poetical drama about a handsome musician who washes up in a small southern town.
Hud
Landmark modern western with Brandon de Wilde from Shane worshipping the wrong hero, Paul Newman’s eponymous heel. According to Paul Schrader, this movie marks the birth of the cynical (anti-)hero in American cinema.