Reefer Madness

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Reefer Madness (1936)
aka: Tell Your Children, The Burning Question, Dope Addict, Doped Youth, and Love Madness.

American cult, exploitation, anti-marijuana propaganda film.

Cautionary tale features a fictionalized take on the use of marijuana. A trio of drug dealers lead innocent teenagers to become addicted to “reefer” cigarettes by holding wild parties with jazz music.

Originally financed by a church group under the title Tell Your Children, the film was intended to be shown to parents as a morality tale, attempting to teach them about the dangers of cannabis use.

Reefer Madness is considered to be a cult classic and one of the most popular examples of a midnight movie. It’s fans enjoy the film for the same unintentionally campy production values that made it a hit in the 1970s.

Interesting Trivia:

Inspired by the case of Victor Licata, who killed his father, mother, two brothers, and a sister with an ax in Tampa, Florida on October 16, 1933, allegedly while under the influence of marijuana. Declared unfit to stand trial for reasons of insanity, subsequent psychiatric examination at the Florida State Mental Hospital determined that Licata suffered from schizophrenia with homicidal tendencies. The Licata case was used to propagandize for the passage of the federal Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 that effectively outlawed legal sales of the “demon weed”.

Producer George A. Hirliman announced production of “Tell Your Children” in Variety, June 15, 1938. It was later sold to an assortment of distributors on a states rights basis, who then used the alternative titles of “The Burning Question” and “Reefer Madness,” in addition to “Tell Your Children,” depending on the region.

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