3. The Girl Can’t Help It

The Girl Can’t Help It isn’t about the status of teenagers, but it had huge impact on teenage audiences. On one level it’s like one of those terrible Don’t Knock The Rock films – just a compendium of performances. But it’s got a more sophisticated plot that alludes to mob involvement in the music business. And it’s got Tom Ewell, who’s a very fine comic actor, and Jayne Mansfield, who’s a fascinating and fated character as well. You get Eddie Cochran and Little Richard – neither of whom played in the UK for another few years – so you can imagine what it meant to The Beatles when they went to see it. All that early rock & roll period is so un-self conscious, people didn’t know what they were doing and The Girl Can’t Help It showed British teenagers the American lifestyle. America is the thing that everyone aspired to at that point. Glorious Technicolor in every way.