Violent Playground is a black and white 1958 British film directed by Basil Dearden and starring Stanley Baker, Peter Cushing, and David McCallum.

[3] McCallum's character, in particular, references roles played by James Dean, Marlon Brando, and especially Vic Morrow in Blackboard Jungle.

In a memorable scene, music appears to put the youths into a trance-like state, culminating in McCallum leading a menacing advance on Baker's character.

When local Juvenile Liaison Officer Sergeant Truman visits the Murphy household he becomes romantically involved with Johnny's sister.

In a final sequence prescient of more recent school shootings, Murphy holds a classroom full of children hostage with a machine-gun, taunting the police on the ground below.

It was, however, given additional theatrical showings in England in 1964–65 to cash in on both its Liverpool background, after the city became famous for being the home of The Beatles, and McCallum's global popularity as Illya Kuryakin in The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

[10] Sight and Sound said that the film "seems a sadly wasted opportunity: a highly experienced director and a young writer, approaching a topical subject of real potentialities, have found in it mainly the familiar material for melodrama.

"[11] The Manchester Guardian's reviewer wrote: "Violent Playground, a not too clinical study of adolescent crime and its environment, has many of the ingredients of a very good film.

The dialogue is intelligent, and the filming, against the background of Liverpool's streets, blitz sites, and teeming blocks of municipal flats is lively and imaginative.

[13] TV Guide noted, "A tautly scripted effort is given a realistic bent through the atmospheric photography and the subtle handling of the children.