The Moviegoer

Adolescence was a period in life when scrapes and worries that now seem minute appeared to be of cataclysmic importance. In case anyone has forgotten this, there is "What a Life" to bring back those memories, fond or otherwise. Jackie Cooper is the butt of all situations that regularly occur in the average high school. Framed into being caught giving a teacher a "hot-seat", into having his name forged on the pawn ticket for the school's band instruments, though guilty of cribbing in an exam, he blunderingly comes out near the top, even to winning the girl, acted by Betty Field, from the popularity kid, played by one James Corner.

The humor is simple and often notable. What the picture lacks in originality is made up for by exuberant prankishness. Unostentatious, "What a Life" does not fail to revive what is no more.