If you’re a teen who lives in North Texas, then today was your first day back to school.  In honor of this event, I’ve been doing a special series of Back to School reviews: 76 reviews in 8 days, all dealing with either high school or being a teenager.  Today, we continue this series by taking a look at The Ringer, a clever 1972 film about drugs, music, and nose rings!

Over the course of 20 minutes, The Ringer tells several different stories.  A girl shoots up heroin and then reacts with disturbing passivity as blood starts to run down her arm in close-up.  A group of ad execs discuss the best way to convince teenagers to buy “ringers,” huge nose rings that will let people know what they believe in.  (While the whole idea behind the ringers is a play on the idea of people being “led by the nose,” it also accurately predicted future fashion and how many educational films can you say that about?)  A group of music executives discuss the best way to market a new band, agreeing that the best strategy would be to make it appear as if the band isn’t being sold while it actually is.  (One of them suggests that they shouldn’t have chairs at any of the band’s shows, in order to make the band seem unpretentious and seriously, we all know that would totally work…)  And finally, there’s the group of drug dealers who strategize about the best way to sell pills to teenagers…

Now, I have to admit that I have a weakness for old educational films but that’s largely because they tend to be so silly.  The Ringer is unique in that it’s actually a very clever and well-done film that deftly uses satire (as opposed to the heavy-handed messaging that we usually tend to associate with educational films) to make its point.  As opposed to many other anti-drug films of the period, The Ringer doesn’t spend any time telling horror stories about what people may or may not do while under the influence but instead, it ridicules and attacks those that get rich off of other people’s addictions.

The Ringer is also interesting because it was the directorial debut of filmmaker Jeff Lieberman, who brought a similar mix of satire and drama to such classic films as Blue Sunshine, Squirm, and Just Before Dawn!  If you keep an eye out, you can spot him playing one of the drug dealers!