Hooked/The Flaming Teenage 2006 Horror Movie Review

Boozers, Losers, and Heroin Users! When sourpuss cop Lieutenant Lacey investigates the disappearance of 17-year-old Ray Bowman, he uncovers a small town festering with high-school hipsters eager to get Hooked!  Sure enough, not only does Bowman turn out to be “a confirmed heroin addict” but a dead one as well—killed by “a hot shot” when he tries to buy a fix on credit. Lacey quickly sends two undercover cops into the field—including director Alexander Wells, posing as a “joypopper”—who zero in on a 21-year-old pusher and his thrill-seeking underage girlfriend who want to introduce a super-square straight-A student to their dope-crazed friends. Also released as Narcotics Squad and Curfew Breakers, Hooked is a gleefully lurid cross between a JD flick, Reefer Madness, and Dragnet from the be-bob bleakness of the 1950s!

Plus: From director Irvin S. Yeaworth, the man who made The Blob, 4-D Man and Way Out, comes the “True-Life Story” of Fred Garland, a liquor-lovin’ talent agent, swindler, and “complete bum” who gets hooked on heroin and ends up becoming… a preacher! Shot in 1952 as Twice Convicted, the film eventually mutated into The Flaming Teenage when additional non-Yeaworth footage was added of teenage alcoholics making damn fools of themselves! And remember, kids: “Whatever way you take it, dope is murder!”