Director Nicholas Ray’s mythic saga of teen disobedience and alienation in 1950s America made James Dean and co-star Natalie Wood instant cultural icons. Ray’s use of color and the Cinemascope screen remains groundbreaking, rivaling Hitchcock for striking frame compositions and bold symbolism. Co-starring Sal Mineo, Jim Backus and Dennis Hopper, and featuring the Griffith Park Observatory. "...The film still breathes like a hurt, brooding animal. It's an indelible vision of a pretty 1950s America with a searing crack in it … a movie so audacious it can only be poetry, a kind of cinematic free verse…" - Peter Stack, San Francisco Chronicle