 Reviewer Jack Moffitt of "The Hollywood Reporter", who correctly thought the film would be a money maker, wrote a less critical, more laudatory review.He found the acting of James Dean, Natalie Wood, and Sal Mineo to be "extraordinarily good", and the direction by Nicholas Ray to be "outstanding".He praised the realistic manner in which Ray depicted the police station scenes and the engaging manner, according to Moffitt, in which he captured the nihilism of the teenage subculture for his audience.