I clicked on the title (Tubi) to see if the film was worth watching. The opening image with a very sharp black and white title sold me. Many older black and white movies appear as a combination of very dark gray and very light gray. “The Strange One” caught my eye and proved its worth.
The marketing image is a great grabber: The Most Fascinating Louse You Ever Met.
Grabber: Students faced with an ethical dilemma about the dehumanization associated with the tradition of hazing at a military college in the Southern United States, take matters into their own hands.
Storyline
Jocko De Paris, cadet leader in a Southern military academy, so manipulates events that George Avery, Jr., son of the school’s executive officer, is found drunk and expelled. Through various pressures, Jocko silences such involuntary accomplices as his roommate Harold Koble, football star Roger Gatt and freshmen Robert Marquales and Maynard Simmons, a girl-fearing cadet whom Jocko terrorizes into dating Rosebud, a town girl.
User Review
A bit better than the overall score would suggest.
“The Strange One” is a very good film but its current score on IMDB would seem to indicate it’s an average film and nothing more. Well, as for me, I loved it as the story was very compelling and it was a nice chance to see some very good actors before they really became famous (such as Ben Gazzara, James Olson and Mark Richmond).
The story is set in some fictional southern military college…similar to VMI or The Citadel. The story mostly centers around Gazzara’s character, an upper classman who is a sociopath who loves mistreating his underclassmen. He also is a master manipulator and all around jerk . . . and his latest ‘prank; results in a cadet being badly beaten and framed for getting drunk . . . when the young man in question did nothing wrong and the alcohol was forced down his throat.
During the course of the story you learn two important things. First, he was caught tormenting underclassmen before. Second, his fellow classmates hated him . . . and it took this incident to bring this to the surface. And, in the end, the students come up with a great plan to deal with this jerk.
Well written, exciting and well worth your time. I found this sleeper on YouTube and hope you also give it a try.
I enjoyed the film and could hardly wait for the “comeuppance” that the character Jocko De Paris deserved. It’s a must see. I watched it alone without telling Peg. I thought she would hate it.
Left to Right: George Peppard and Arthur Storch were roomies in the production. I think Storch had false front teeth to make him look slightly goofy.
A very enjoyable production.
