As I began watching "The Beat Generation", I never suspected the film would eventually turn into a giant mess of a film. After all, it started off well and addressed several important issues that other films didn't dare talk about at the time--such as rape and abortion. But, somewhere along the line, the film just disintegrated--as if the second half of the film didn't even have a script. And, when it became bad, it became REALLY bad!
The film stars Ray Danton as a serial rapist. But he's different that the run-of-the-mill molester--he is very calculating and evil. Not only does he rape the women, but afterwords sets up the home where the attack took place to look as if the women had invited him in and it was consensual! And, a narrow-minded knucklehead cop (Steve Cochran) falls right into this trap and blames the first victim. But, this comes back to haunt him when the sicko later rapes the cop's wife--and Cochran is forced to face this. But, since he is still a bit of a jerk himself, the cop becomes obsessed with catching this guy and ends up nearly destroying his marriage in the process.
From the description above, the film sounds interesting--especially when the wife ends up pregnant and they don't know which man is the father--the cop or the rapist! But this is handled rather poorly--and the rest of the film is just awful. Why they had to include all the silly beatniks, I have no idea. And, some of these 'young people' were simply ridiculous--including a 55 year-old Maxie Rosenblum--who, inexplicably, starts wrestling with the cop later in the film! The ending is a mess and you just have to see it to believe it--especially when magic apparently occurs and the cop and his wife work things out and forget all their disagreements. Sloppy and not worth your time--and also not bad enough to make it good viewing for a bad movie buff.
The film stars Ray Danton as a serial rapist. But he's different that the run-of-the-mill molester--he is very calculating and evil. Not only does he rape the women, but afterwords sets up the home where the attack took place to look as if the women had invited him in and it was consensual! And, a narrow-minded knucklehead cop (Steve Cochran) falls right into this trap and blames the first victim. But, this comes back to haunt him when the sicko later rapes the cop's wife--and Cochran is forced to face this. But, since he is still a bit of a jerk himself, the cop becomes obsessed with catching this guy and ends up nearly destroying his marriage in the process.
From the description above, the film sounds interesting--especially when the wife ends up pregnant and they don't know which man is the father--the cop or the rapist! But this is handled rather poorly--and the rest of the film is just awful. Why they had to include all the silly beatniks, I have no idea. And, some of these 'young people' were simply ridiculous--including a 55 year-old Maxie Rosenblum--who, inexplicably, starts wrestling with the cop later in the film! The ending is a mess and you just have to see it to believe it--especially when magic apparently occurs and the cop and his wife work things out and forget all their disagreements. Sloppy and not worth your time--and also not bad enough to make it good viewing for a bad movie buff.