cult film freak: JILL IRELAND IN THE GIRLS-BEHIND-BARS DRAMA 'SO EVIL, SO YOUNG'

Jill Ireland in SO EVIL, SO YOUNG Year: 1961 Rating: ***

When framed-for-burglary good girl Jill Ireland is put into isolation in an all-girls reformatory, the already unfitting mellow jazz soundtrack suddenly explodes into a bedlam of vibes and horns, almost seeming like that very music's being pumped into the room to drive her crazy, as she starts grabbing the bars, desperately wanting to get out...

Contrasting to what begins as a rather tame earlier version of THE LONELINESS OF THE LONG DISTANCE RUNNER but involving girls... and yes, SO EVIL SO YOUNG is a women's prison movie taking place in more of a boarding bunkhouse... and there are some pretty ingenues including Ireland's JUNGLE STREET co-starlet Gillian Watts: But one scene-stealing inmate gains much-needed momentum during the third act...

Gillian Watt (left) in SO EVIL, SO YOUNG

And that's when this otherwise surprisingly dull, stagnant camera melodrama gains urgency and actually has a purpose: the token bullying guard lady, provided a cane and limp to add to her repressed villainy, becomes a target for a particular inmate who's both friendly (defending the cliche vulnerable girl who winds up taking her life) and a kind of revolutionary in tall and intense Olive McFarland...

So the pot-boiling plot really comes down to when she'll eventually go against bratty antagonist Joceyln Britton, initially responsible for framing Jill Ireland, who, while being the main star, gets somewhat lost in a vehicle where ultimately, neither she as an actress or her character truly belong — because while she's YOUNG like the others, she's never EVIL, not even ambiguously.