Dennis, the Menace and More

For the past 36 years, audiences have watched Dennis Hopper grow up before their eyes. And thanks to video, one can see Hopper make the transition from rebellious teen to drugged-out hippie to middle-aged freak with a penchant for blue velvet.

Here is a sampling of Hopper films available on video that illustrate his many faces and facets.

Dennis and Jimmy: Dennis Hopper was still a teen-ager when he made his film debut as a high school gang member in 1955’s Rebel Without a Cause (Warner Home Video). You may have a hard time recognizing the 18-year-old. A member of Buzz’s (Corey Allen) gang, Hopper is the blond, angelic-looking guy in blue jeans who makes new student James Dean’s life miserable. His big scenes come near the end of the film when he and other gang members drive around Los Angeles at night trying to find Dean after Buzz is killed in the “Chicky Run.”

Hopper and Dean became friends while making “Rebel” and just a few months later co-starred together (with Elizabeth Taylor and Rock Hudson) in Giant (Warner Home Video). The film marked Dean’s last screen appearance before his death in a car crash Sept. 30, 1955.

George Stevens won an Oscar for his direction of the sprawling melodrama based on Edna Ferber’s best-seller about a wealthy Texas cattle family. Hopper has a major role in the three-hour-plus epic as Jordan, the sincere young son of Taylor and Hudson who becomes a doctor and encounters vicious prejudice when he marries a Hispanic woman.

And You Thought “Blue Velvet” Was Weird: Hopper’s career was at a standstill after he and director Henry Hathaway feuded while making 1957’s “From Hell to Texas.” He did manage to find work on TV and in low-budget independent films such as 1961’s Night Tide (Film Forum).

Written and directed by Curtis Harrington (“Games”), “Night Tide” is an atmospheric thriller that’s not for all tastes, but definitely worth a look. Shot in black and white at the Santa Monica Pier, “Night Tide” finds Hopper as a sweet, naive sailor who falls in love with a woman who works as a mermaid in a pier attraction. He begins to believe, though, this beautiful woman may actually be a real mermaid.

Dennis and the Duke: Despite his troubles with Hathaway, the director took a chance on Hopper and cast him in the 1965 John Wayne Western The Sons of Katie Elder (Paramount Home Video), as the weakling son of the man who killed Wayne’s mom, Katie Elder.

And four years later, you can catch Hopper in a brief scene as a bad guy who is roughed up by Rooster Cogburn (Wayne) in Hathaway’s True Grit (Paramount Home Video). Hopper took the money he earned from “True Grit” and used it to finance “Easy Rider.”

Wild and Wooly: During the late ‘60s, Hopper quite literally let his hair down in a few exploitation flicks, including the 1967 turkey The Glory Stompers (Trylon Video). Hopper plays a motorcycle leader who’s favorite expression is “man.”

And like wow! Hopper, Peter Fonda, Bruce Dern and Susan Strasberg experience the joys and wonders of LSD in 1967’s The Trip (Vestron Video).

Hopper and Fonda, though, had much better success with 1969’s Easy Rider (RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video), which became one of the most influential films of that era. Hopper directed and co-wrote the script, which features him and Fonda as dope peddlers who travel across America on their motorcycles.

“Easy Rider” resurrected the careers of Hopper and Fonda and made Jack Nicholson a star. Hopper and Fonda received an Oscar nomination for their screenplay.

The Mistake: Hopper followed up “Easy Rider” with the 1971 overindulgent The Last Movie (United American Video Corporation), which saw extremely limited release and won a place in Michael Medved’s book “The Fifty Worst Films of All Time.”

Shot in Peru, “Last Movie” is a movie-within-a-movie, but you’ll need a Little Orphan Annie decoder ring to figure it out.

It Was a Very Good Year: After battling drugs and alcohol, Hopper made a remarkable comeback in 1986. He scared the wits out of audiences with his over-the-top performance in David Lynch’s nightmarish Blue Velvet (Image Entertainment) as a sadistic drug dealer who terrorizes a nightclub singer (Isabella Rossellini) and involves a young man (Kyle MacLachlan) in his wicked perversions.

Hopper received a best supporting actor Oscar nomination for his luminous but less memorable work the same year in Hoosiers (Vestron Video). Hopper plays an alcoholic basketball fan who sobers up to help coach his son’s high school basketball team.

In the Hopper: The actor received terrific reviews earlier this year for his disturbing turn as a racist storekeeper who murders a black child and his mother and rapes his wife (Barbara Hershey) with a Coke bottle in Showtime’s Paris Trout. Not for the squeamish, “Paris Trout” will be released Aug. 8 on video (Media Home Entertainment).