My Boys Are Good Boys (1978)

I love this movie so much

For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

As one of the previous reviewers confessed this film had all the earmarks of a tax write-off which it was for producer and star Ralph Meeker. Meeker got old Hollywood names Ida Lupino, Lloyd Nolan and Bosley from Charlie's Angels David Doyle to join him in this project.Meeker is an armored car guard and he has a son Sean Roche in a reform school. Roche and his buddies from a reform school execute a well thought out plan along with Roche's sister Kerry Lynn to rob Meeker's armored car on its rounds collecting coins. Unlike bills completely untraceable, that part was well thought out. So was the actual robbery. But the idea is to do it and get back before this juvenile penal institution does its head count as these places are wont to do.Lloyd Nolan as the security investigator for the armored car company is the only one who doesn't just go through the motions. The rest act like they are waiting for paychecks to clear from Ralph Meeker. The rest of the cast it's like we're seeing an amateur theater group.This was Ida Lupino's farewell acting job. Too bad she couldn't go out on something better.

I had never heard of it before watching this seventies crime movie. A crime flick that looks like a fifties or late forties film, speaking of juvenile delinquency. Not the seventies genre, for sure. The story is very surprising, where a bunch of very young hoodlums pull a daring and clever armored truck heist, behaving like professionals. Very surprising. I did not expect so much. And seeing old movie actors like Oda Lupino and Lloyd Nolan is pretty weird and funny too. Yes, a very good little film which grabs you, despite the fact that you have only a few spectacular and exciting elements. But don't misunderstand me, that's not a masterpiece, just a smart little grade B picture. Music score all along the film is pretty entertaining too.

Reform school resident Sean Thomas Roche (as Tommy Morton) receives a visit from father Ralph Meeker (as Bert Morton), who informs him schoolteacher mother Ida Lupino (as Bess Morton) is retiring. Clearly, Mr. Meeker and Mr. Roche have some "generation gap" difficulties; but, they pale in comparison with the love lost between the two men and Ms. Lupino. Lupino could care less about her delinquent son; instead, she enjoys tutoring pretty young Kerry Lynn (as Priscilla). Little do the adults know, but the "kids" are plotting… This sometimes confusing, and seldom plausible, "misunderstood kids drama" has a few interesting attributes. Old pro Lloyd Nolan tries to sort out the plot; he contributes greatly to an interesting cast. Prrforming admirably, Mr. Nolan makes everyone sharing his screen time look better. David Doyle, waiting for "Charlie's Angels" to resume, has quite a "My Boys Are Good Boys" backstory to tell. Notably, Lupino's shrewish characterization was her last film appearance, before retiring.

In 1977, when I was still endeavoring to be an actor, Colleen Meeker, Ralph Meeker's spouse, spread the word that any actors who were hungry enough to work for "nothing", to get a "film credit" --she had the project for them. Keenan Wynn, who had been approached to be in the film, helped to get me an audition, and I was cast as the "reformatory guard".Remember there were no direct-to-video films made at that time. Until a couple of years ago, I was not even aware that this film made it to VHS. Most of the actors, myself included, agreed to turn their paychecks back into the production kitty, in lieu of promises to be paid when the film finally opened. Well it never officially opened in any theater that I was cognizant of. There was a full page ad taken out in Variety, and I saved that. I had heard a rumor that the film was shown once on late night local LA television.So it was an under the radar production. I never received a dime for doing it. It was not a SAG sanctioned picture, and therefore there never were residuals forthcoming. We thought of it as a slim-budgeted tax write off for Ralph Meeker's production company. It gave the opportunity for several over-the-hill burned out Hollywood stars to have one more Hurrah in front of an actual camera; specifically Lloyd Nolan, Ralph Meeker, and Ida Lupino (called Lupe by her friends). David Doyle was still pre-CHARLIE'S ANGELS at that point. My scenes were with him.It was directed by Bethel "Buck" Buckalew, aka Peter Perry, and Arthur P. Stootsberry. He cast himself as a cop in one scene. He was one of those just under the surface Hollywood Indie movers and shakers that had been around, and busy, since the 60's; semi-functioning as an actor, producer, writer, second-unit director, and sometimes director. He made, or was a part of production companies that made dozens of terrible, crappy, yet wonderfully bizarre non-union almost-seen-by-no one films; like KNOCKERS UP (1963), and CYCLE VIXENS (1978).As the other reviews and comments have suggested, the plot of the film, such as it is, had to do with some malcontent teenagers, bad boys from a reformatory, and one bad girl, who robbed an armored car. Ralph Meeker drove the armored car, as the security guard. His bad son planned the robbery to "hurt" his father. At the time, I was actually embarrassed to have my name associated with the pic, but after all these turgid decades, looking back in fond retrospect --I no longer want to disassociate myself from it. I love it. Recently I watched the film with 30 film club members, and we all laughed and enjoyed the movie. It was very camp, all those 70's hair-dos and clothes, car chases, and wretched vapid idiotic dialogue. It reminded me of viewing an Ed Wood film. Lloyd Nolan was the only actor to rise above the material, besides myself of course. The film is now, according to the internet, building a cult following. Go figure.