fertilecelluloid Review of The Child Molester

The Child Molester (1964)

Inept but disturbing stranger danger film

[8/10 · 15 October 2008]

"The Child Molester", produced by the Highway Safety Foundation, was made to educate children about the consequences of going off with strangers. Although it does mention "men who enjoy touching children", it avoids the words "sex" and "rape". It does not, however, avoid a graphic montage of molested children whose brains have been bashed out. Although this section of the film is short, it is utterly horrific. Directed by the oddball Herbert J. Leder, the man who brought us "The Candy Man", the film focuses on the abduction and stalking of two very young children as their parents and the police attempt to reconcile what has happened. Technically, it is bargain basement, but it is precisely this attribute that makes it all the more disturbing. The graphic footage, which climaxes the film, is meant to represent the fate of the two girls who became the child molester's victims. The molester looks like a Ward Cleaver type and drives the kind of car that Ward would have driven. Intercut with the main story are short vignettes of children escaping the clutches of molesters of various shapes and sizes; a boy has his leg grabbed in a movie theater, another is attacked in an alleyway. The tone is alarmist beyond belief, the imagery implying that there is a molester on every street corner and outside every window. Apparently, the film was screened to school children briefly, then withdrawn. Considering the horrific crime photos on display, I'm not surprised. It must have caused a nightmare of ten.