FOUR BOYS AND A GUN

Mono-planed, nonyllabic story of a neighborhood crime, and of the dead-end youngsters who were in on the holdup which led to a killing. In flashbacks, you get the boys and their families; a sequence of pool rooms and bedrooms; of easy takes in cash and skirts. Initiative, with none of the power of Farrell, Wright and their lik; even the occasional vitality of certain bits cannot redeem its sordidness. A derivative of basic American, genuinely tough -- and I mean tough. Skip it.