The unusual film noir The Bloody Brood (1959) is set in the daddio beatnik world of bongos, jazz, modern art, cynical poetry, digging the scene, & avoiding the squares. Beats are portrayed as decadent, drug abusing, morally suspect rebels with morbid fascinations for death, providing a ripe playground that a psycho might dominate.

Peter Falk is Nico, the hipster philosoher very influential in the scene. To fight off his boredom, he talks one of his friends (Ron Hartmann) into a thrill killing, feeding Roy (Bill Kowalchuk), a sweet young bicycle messanger who isn't part of the beat scene, a hamburger laced with ground glass.

Roy's older brother Cliff (Jack Betts) together with Inspector McCloud (Robert Christie) investigates Ray's murder. Nico remains a cool cat throughout but his collaborator may be losing it.

The sets & high-contrast b/w cinematography & Peter Falk's performance all lend a grim vitality to the film. Though the beat movement is portrayed as little more than a criminal underground for vice, the fashion of it has an air of authenticity despite promoting the usual adult terror of youth culture.

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