Because he had no code, except an aesthetic one—a commitment to a style of life—he was easily betrayed by those he trusted. There he was, the new primitive, a Byronic Dead-End Kid, with his quality of vulnerability. His acting was so physical—so exploratory, tentative, wary—that we could sense with him, feel him pull back at the slightest hint of rebuff. We in the audience felt protective: we knew how lonely he must be in his assertiveness. Who even in hell wants to be an outsider? And he was no intellectual who could rationalize it, learn somehow to accept it, to live with it. He could only feel it, act it out, be “The Wild One”—and God knows how many kids felt, “That’s the story of my life.” — PAULINE KAEL
