======
College playboy Gardner "Ding" Pruitt III seduces young women by inviting them to his luxurious apartment, where he serves them alcoholic drinks. Sandy Palmer has socialized with Ding, but she refuses all his invitations to his apartment.
At the beginning of the movie, he is asking her merely to go on a date with him (is not inviting her again to his apartment). She refuses to go on a date with him, saying that she needs to study for a test. Because he persists, she relents to a date later that evening.
For the date, she insists that he take her to The Silver Palms nightclub where her Uncle Sid and Uncle Woody perform as singers. The two uncles have forbidden their niece Sandy to enter the nightclub, but now she can pretend that her date Ding has taken her into the nightclub. When Woody sees Sandy and Ding in the nightclub, he throws both of them out.
Since they have been thrown out of the nightclub, Ding tries to take advantage of the unexpected situation by inviting Sandy again to his apartment. As always, Sandy again refuses to go to his apartment, because she foresees that he will serve her alcoholic drinks and try to seduce her. Sandy demands that Ding drive her back to her sorority. The date has ended.
Soon afterwards, a long time passes in the story. Woody has begun a drunken-comic act that becomes very successful. Woody now earn so much money by performing his comic act that he and Sid are able to buy the nightclub. They rename the nightclub as Surf's Up, and they refashion it to attract more college students as customers. They establish new procedures in the nightclub to make sure that alcoholic drinks are not served to the many customers who are younger than the legal drinking age, which is 21. The too-young customers are served only soft drinks, such as Pepsi Cola.
The movie skips over that interval -- at least a few months -- when Uncle Woody and Uncle Sid become able to buy the nightclub and then refashion it.
=====
During that months-long interval, Sandy and Ding have continued to date, platonically. He has stopped inviting her to his apartment, because he knows she will not fall for that tactic of his. Furthermore, he has stopped dating other women. Ding and Sandy have established a steady boyfriend-girlfriend relationship.
Instead of drinking alcohol and engaging in sexual activities in his apartment, Ding and Sandy drink lemonade and surf at the beach.
 |
| Ding and Sandy drinking lemonade at the beach |
Like all the other beach movies of the early 1960s, there is no "dirty dancing". Everyone dances the twist to pop music that is played by Caucasian musicians. None of those movies play any Negro music -- or even show any Negroes at all.
In the evenings, the college students go to the nightclub to enjoy dances that look like this:
Click on the above image and then
click on the link Watch this video on YouTube
======
Another wholesome activity shown in the movie For Those Who Think Young is the National Collegiate Ice Cream Eating Contest, which takes place in Baskin-Robbins ice-cream shops.
The students of Ocean Crest College support their college's contestant as he eats as much ice cream as he can during the game period. Of course, the college's contestant wears a suit and tie during the competition.
See, college students in 1964 did not have to binge-drink alcohol in order to have fun!
======
In my previous article Why Penny and Robbie risked pregnancy, I pointed out the importance of the social rules about "going steady" during the late 1950s and early 1960s. A young couple would follow those rules in a progression that led gradually into sexual activities. In the case of Penny and Robbie in Dirty Dancing, they had followed the going-steady rules to a point where they felt that sexual intercourse was appropriate.
In the case of Sandy and Ding in For Those Who Think Young, she compelled him to stop trying to use alcohol in order to short-circuit the progression toward sexual intercourse. During the skipped-over months-long interval in the movie's story, Ding was patiently following the going-steady rules with Sandy.
======
One day at the beach, Sandy decides that the time has come to advance to a more intimate stage in their relationship. This key scene begins at about 1:07:30 in the following video.
Sandy confides to her friend Karen Cross (played by Nancy Sinatra) that she is about to take an action that will show that she no longer is "too nice" for Ding. Furthermore, she will show that Ding perhaps is "too nice" for her.
In other words, because of Ding's months-long compliance with the going-steady rules, Sandy is about to take the initiative to advance their relationship forward from a stage that has become "too nice". Sandy remarks that she has been "treading water" and will soon "make my move when I'm ready". After a short wait, Sandy declares to Karen that now she is "ready". Sandy approaches Ding and begins to dance with him.
As Sandy begins to dance with Ding, however, he immediately invites her to his apartment. She responds that his apartment is "off-limits". She wants to advance their relationship, but she still does not want to go to his apartment, where she foresees that he will serve her alcohol and try to undress and seduce her.
Because Sandy still refuses to go to his apartment, Ding lies to her that he is inviting her to his apartment next Tuesday in order to celebrate his 21st birthday. He assures her that a lot of people will be at his party, and so she agrees to come to the birthday party in his apartment on Tuesday.
======
Because of Ding's sudden invitation to his apartment to celebrate his birthday, Sandy does not follow through on her declared intention to "make my move". The movie audience does not know what she intended to do.
I think that Sandy intended to advance to "second base" with him. She did not intend to do so right there in the middle of that beach party, but she intended to do so after the beach party. The "baseball bases" of the going-steady rules have been defined as follows:
First base = kissing, including open-mouth (or French) kissingSandy had decided to "make her move" by advancing from first base to second base in their relationship. Surprised, however, by Ding's invitation to his apartment to celebrate his birthday, Sandy decided to postpone her move until after that birthday party.
Second base = petting above the waist, including touching, feeling, and fondling the chest, breasts, and nipples
Third base = petting or orally stimulating below the waist, including touching, feeling, and fondling the vagina, clitoris, penis, or testicles
Home base = sexual intercourse
======
I will continue this article in Part 7.
No comments:
Post a Comment