Hollywood High: A Totally Epic, Way Opinionated History of Teen Movies

This piercing analysis from journalist and humorist Handy (Wild Things) surveys how teen films throughout the decades have reflected adolescents’ shifting concerns and place in society. He suggests that teens “were seen less as their own species than as not-quite adults” well into the 1930s and ’40s, as exemplified by Mickey Rooney’s Andy Hardy films, which followed the quaint tribulations of the teen protagonist but were aimed as much at parents as kids. The notion of the teenager as a distinct archetype with their own culture emerged alongside booming high school attendance rates spurred by New Deal–era compulsory education laws. This shift inspired such postwar movies as Rebel Without a Cause, which dramatized anxieties around the growing gulf between parents and their emboldened children. Handy also traces shifting attitudes around adolescent sexuality, discussing how the Beach Party movies of the 1960s showed “lots of flesh but no sex” and how Fast Times at Ridgemont High reflected growing levels of sex positivity across the 1970s. Elsewhere, Handy examines how Mean Girls arose out of a moral panic around female bullying and how the Hunger Games franchise dramatized teen defiance. The smart exegesis provides both a doting love letter to teen films and a fascinating history of the teen’s place in society. This entertains. Agent: Jennifer Joel, CAA. (May)