kidboots There only seems to be one delinquent daughter, Sally, and she is a toughie!! When the police visit the high school to investigate a girl's suicide, she struts into the Principal's office like she was born to the streets and proceeds to smart mouth the policeman who is there to ask questions. And no wonder she thinks she is so smart - the policeman is sooo dumb!! There is almost a fight when she thinks good girl June (June Carlson) is about to give her away but he still doesn't twig that there is maybe something fishy going on!! June is one of the "delinquent daughters" as well but she definitely isn't. She is trying to cope with a father who wants to beat goodness into her at every opportunity. There is also Betty played by Marie Bovard, who didn't have a big career due to her very annoyingly screechy voice - she is played too dumb to be a bad girl. They all hang out at the "Merry Go Round" which is like a road house for the younger set. It is run by Mimi (Fifi D'Orsay, who had a brief moment in the limelight in the early 30s, Bing Crosby sang "Temptation" to her) and Nick, who is a real crook and is also enticing a few of the wayward kids (Jimmy and Sally) to commit robberies.I do agree the film quality leaves a lot to be desired - at one point there was a vertical white line through the print and then the film went completely dark!! I know it is PRC but surely they weren't too poor for lights!!! At the 50 minute mark June and Rocky decide to elope but are stopped by police and then all the wayward kids and their parents (except Sally) are given a stern lecture by the JP and usually this is were this type of movie ends but not for Sally!! She is now Nick's new girl and after a cat fight with Mimi - she and Nick are now on their way to - Nowhere!!!Teala Loring, as Sally, really lets her hair down - she was obviously at her best playing bad girls. Her career didn't amount to much, the highlight would have been playing opposite Kay Francis (albeit at the very end of her career) in a couple of Monogram cheapies - "Allotment Wives" and "Wife Wanted". June Carlson had "grown up" in the ghastly Jones family series and when it came to an end she tried to find other roles, the result being things like "Delinquent Daughters" - she retired within a few years.

classicsoncall So I'm watching the flick, and I start thinking to myself - Good grief, did people actually pay good money to watch stuff like this back in the Forties? Yeah, I know, admission was probably only about a quarter at best, but still, you could have had a couple sodas at the malt shop. Straight out of the exploitation/educational film camp, "Delinquent Daughters" attempts to instruct and admonish parents for the 'Alarming Increase of Juvenile Delinquency' as touted in a newspaper headline quote from J. Edgar Hoover. I have a pretty good idea that none of the genre's films had much impact regarding their intended mission, other than the covert one of titillation and cheap thrills.As far as this one goes, it's pretty uneven in both the acting and production values. The print I viewed from the Mill Creek Entertainment set of 'Cult Classics' was of questionable quality; it was easy to pick out the night time scenes because they all looked like they were filmed completely in the dark. The story follows the off screen set up of a high school girl suicide, and goes on to explore the antics of various teenagers, none of whom seem to feel any remorse for the dead teen, who one describes as 'a nice girl but no angel'. It would have seemed more appropriate if the picture explored the angst these high schoolers felt over the death of a friend, but it seems she didn't have one.Hey, how about that Jerry (Jimmy Zahner), all worked up over the gun point robbery he pulled at the grocery store. He got away with $2.80!!! Who wrote this? And you can't beat old Rocky's (Johnny Duncan) logic in trying to convince June (June Carlson) to marry him - Martha Washington was only sixteen when she got married, and she wound up with a president! I guess the highlight, as a number of other reviewers have pointed out, was old Judge Craig's (Frank McGlynn) speech to gathered teens and parents alike noting that the proper attention and discipline might have prevented all the bad things from happening in their kids' lives. More simplistic than compelling, one comes away with a feeling of 'Yeah, right', just as the scene dissolves into a decade early preview of American Bandstand to provide a happy ending. Not one of the better flicks in the 'Cult Classics' collection, you might want to check out one of their drug, sex or alcohol treatments instead.

Jay Raskin This was on the compilation DVD, Cult Classics. The transfered print was awful. There was a big scratch running through print for about fifteen minutes. About fifteen minutes of the night material was so dark that you might as well be listening to the radio.What can be seen is quite poorly written. We are talking Ed Wood bad here. A woman pulls a gun on a man. The man says, "What have you got there." She answers, "Something that goes boom, boom, boom!" Teara Loring is interesting as a real sociopath. She really enjoys lying and stealing. Mary Boward gives a cute performance as a blond airhead, more blond and more airhead than anything in movies until Marilyn Monroe's comic performances.Fifi D'Orsay is funny as a French woman.Other than a few interesting performances, the bad dialogue and inane plot make the film difficult to take seriously. It is only redeemable for a few camp moments.

Leslie Howard Adams The newspaper-ads promotional material for this film featured a series of Coming Soon theatre script-written teaser-ads comprised of daily entries in "The Diary of a Delinquent Daughter." June writes:Wednesday: "Had my first drink of whiskey today. Tastes awful...but what a wallop! Guess I passed out. If Dad knew what I was doing I'd get trounced! Gosh...wonder if he really cares what happens to me?"Thursday: "Nick wants me to run away with him. Says I'm old enough to know my own mind. I'm sixteen, but I look older when I use makeup...Wish I could confide in Mom or Dad!" Friday: "Can you keep a secret, diary? I'm going to slip away tonight. Dad will probably be tight as usual and Mom out painting the town (also as usual.) So it shouldn't be too difficult. I'm scared a little bit but I just can't stand things here!" Saturday: "I'm on my way to the big city with Nick. That's the fellow I met at the dance. I'm in love with him, I guess, but he makes me awfully jealous. Always making passes at some other girl when I'm around. But anything is better than what I left behind."Sunday: "What a big baby I am...I've been crying. I'm not homesick, just a little bit scared. Nick accused me of flirting and hit me. Just found out he's broke. We've got to get some money some way, and fast!"The only reason to see the movie after that series of ads ran was to find out if Nick had figured out by Monday a swell way June could make them some money...from real-friendly strangers...fast.