"Seven savage punks on a binge of violence!" the ads promised. Can you dig it? Released in a double bill with Dragstrip Riot, The Cool and the Crazy has since become a genuine cult film, treating as it does the subject of marijuana leading to the harder stuff: armed robbery, murder. The Variety reviewer, perhaps high on something else, commented that the film "has the irritating itch of reality about it" and also compared the film to Italian neorealism. (This wasn't far off; during filming in Kansas City, two of the actors were supposedly arrested as "delinquents.") Cool is a typical example of AIP going all out on a subject more sensible studios wouldn't touch. Sam Arkoff writes, "Marijuana was treated as such a taboo in the movie that it was referred to only as 'M.' No one would dare actually say the word!"