In the second of Francis Ford Coppola’s youth problem pictures adapted from SE Hinton’s popular novels, Matt Dillon stars as a vulnerable teenager who idolises his elder brother, Mickey Rourke, a former gang leader.
Unlike Coppola’s more conventional The Outsiders (1983), this alienated teen allegory finds him pulling out all the stylistic stops.
The drama is extremely mannered and the symbolism is a touch overdone, but it’s a visually startling knockout, brilliantly filmed in moody black and white with some dashes of colour.
The Outsiders and Rumble Fish were shot back-to-back in Tulsa. Stewart Copeland (of The Police) composed the brooding score.
Rusty-James
Matt Dillon
Motorcycle Boy
Mickey Rourke
Patty
Diane Lane
Father
Dennis Hopper
Cassandra
Diana Scarwid
Steve
Vincent Spano
Smokey
Nicolas Cage
B J Jackson
Chris Penn
Midget
Laurence Fishburne
Patterson
William Smith
Biff Wilcox
Glenn Withrow
Benny
Tom Waits
Director
Francis Ford Coppola
