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If you wander into any random college dorm, you’re bound to catch a glimpse of a James Dean poster on some young co-ed’s wall. He’s got that perfectly chiseled face and that iconic glint in his eye. He’s pretty with an edge of danger.
The problem is that there’s a high chance that co-ed has never seen a James Dean movie.
James Dean only shot three major motion pictures before his untimely death in 1955, but even now, a day after what would have been his 84th birthday, he’s still considered a pop culture titan. But why? What is it specifically about Dean that makes us go wild?
It’s easy to pinpoint one source of his allure: he was hot. The boy was gorgeous. Dean was also considered one of the brightest acting stars of his generation. So, he was not only a pretty face, but he also had oodles of talent to back it up. And then there’s that whole, “Live fast, die young, and leave behind a good-looking corpse” ethos he represents. His premature death not only lent him an aura of mystery and danger, but it also ensured that we never saw him peak. He will always be young, handsome, and full of promise. He will never be over-the-hill or mired by scandalous mistakes.
However, Dean is an enduring American pop culture icon for another deeper reason: he defined a new type of masculinity that was less about virility and more about vulnerability.
Before Dean, male movie stars had to have a certain swagger. Cary Grant, Clark Gable, Humphrey Bogart, and even Jimmy Stewart all possessed a self-assured confidence. These men might find themselves down on their luck, but they don’t loose their cool. They might fall in love and and be pushed to the brink, but they always pull from within and get it together. They’re old school “men.” They have jobs to do and they get them done.
James Dean was never like that. Sure, he was sexy, but he was also a big old softie. He always seemed on the verge of breaking down, and in fact, he often did so on screen. The method actor poured himself into his roles and improvised fits of passion. One famous instance of this was when broke from the script in East of Eden. His character was supposed to flee from his disappointed father, but instead, Dean embraces him and weeps. Director Elia Kazan was so taken by the moment that he kept in in the final cut.
Dean’s next film was Rebel Without A Cause. While the film didn’t secure him an Oscar nomination (as East of Eden and Giant both did), it did cement him as a cultural icon. He’s forever linked with Jim Stark: that intoxicating youth as hungry for love as he is for freedom. Jim Stark is yet another Dean character desperate for paternal approval. Indeed, if you could sum up Dean’s three film roles, you would say that he was a pro at playing sensitive loners who needed their daddy’s love. Does that sound like he was a bastion of masculinity? No, but Dean reflected a psychological mood that was gripping a generation and that would spark the Beat movement, the political upheaval of the sixties, and our modern interpretation of strength.
Above all, Dean was seductive, and so he made sensitivity sexy. Before him, men and women were supposed to stick to their roles and hold it together. Dean showed America — and the world — that the most interesting thing a person could be was open to life’s electricity. His vulnerability demonstrated a new kind of courage that we’re all still enamored with to this day. [Where to Stream East of Eden, Rebel Without A Cause, and Giant]
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[Photo: Everett Collection]
