The correct answer is John Steinbeck's "East Of Eden", starring a charismatic but misunderstood James Dean.
That explains why I couldn't figure it out... I've never seen that. But I did watch a fan made trailer of it right after I watched Rebel Without a Cause, becuase I was thinking about buying it.
If you liked Brando in Streetcar Named Desire, you'll love East of Eden.
Same kind feel. Protagonist misunderstood, completely over-acted..but in a good way. It is one of those movies were it was measured up against an amazing book, and rather than interpret it, it tried to stay completely true to the original work.
Have you ever seen film adaptations of Tim Krabbe's "The Golden Egg"?
AARRR! CAUTION MATEY! THERE BE SPOILERS BELOW!!1It was a book about how some guy's girlfriend got kidnapped, and then the kidnapper offers him to "do the same thing to him as he did to her" and he agrees and gets burried alive?
Well, in the Dutch film version, it's the same. In the American version however, they escape and kill the bad guy.
I hate it when they do that.
[/spoilers]
oh and also:
[/rant on something trivial because you reminded me of it]