He died in a car crash aged 24 with just three feature films on his CV, but James Dean has been an instantly recognisable star for more than 40 years. This is partly because he was a very compelling actor and an attractive man. In addition, what we know about his personality, and what we see in the characters he played, is a moody, alienated but gentle young man struggling to come to terms with his life. For succeeding generations of young people this has had meaning and resonance; he helps teenagers to believe that boys don't have to be macho or even popular to be basically "cool".
Of course, his early death freezes him into character for all time; we have no older, conflicting images of him to interfere with the youthful icon.
The tragic overtones of Rebel Without a Cause are amplified by Dean's death - and by the deaths about 20 years later of co-stars Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo: she drowned in strange circumstances; he was murdered.
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