DRIVE A CROOKED ROAD (1954)

This lower-budget Columbia Pictures drama succeeds thanks to its excellent cast and screenplay. A better-than-average B-movie centering around an automotive theme. It starts off in a realistic fashion, hiding the plot initially with racing sequences filmed on location in southern California. Outside of these scenes, a studio Jaguar XK120 prop car is being hounded by rear-projected cars, however. Scenes are also filmed at an actual automotive repair shop and it is an eye-full for foreign car fans and Detroit's contribution as well. Under echoes of the garage's concrete interior, each vehicle is lined up in its stall as their tune-up awaits.

Mickey Rooney is first-rate as a naive master mechanic and part-time racer of the aforementioned Jaguar. He lives and breathes automobiles leaving little time for socializing. Throwing a wrench into his garage is Dianne Foster, who brings her car in specifically asking for Rooney to work on it. The very next day, Foster again has “car trouble” with her British Hillman―probably expected―but Rooney has to drive to her apartment this time. Being the perfect gentleman, he gets her car started with no more than a thank you expected. She quickly gets him started, twisting him so tightly around her finger it is cutting off the circulation. He is unpretentiously smitten by the amazon female. She is a woman with interior...uh...ulterior motives. Kevin McCarthy and Jack Kelly finish out this deceitful trio.

McCarthy―looking surprisingly like Max Headroom at times―has been scouting local race tracks for a fast driver, though his interest has nothing to do with competitive racing. He and Kelly single out Rooney as their ideal unassuming candidate. Like diesel fuel in sub-zero weather, the plot thickens. Along the way, most of Kelly's lines are witty remarks usually at Rooney's expense. Script lines perfectly befitting Kelly's condescending delivery. McCarthy wants Rooney to drive a crooked, dangerous road in twenty minutes that would safely take forty. In mock fascination, he pumps up Rooney's ego on what it would take to do this. Puzzled, Rooney cannot figure out their intense interest in why twenty minutes is so important. He immediately yanks the handbrake on their getaway plan. McCarthy smooths things over and suggests he see Foster before deciding, whose prearranged story ignites Rooney's spark plugs again.

Showing sincere remorse for towing Rooney along, Foster bluntly spills her guts much to McCarthy's ire. Rooney knows a bit too much at this point. It is Kelly's job to eliminate him along the coastal roadway. As an excellent driver, Rooney also knows how to roll a car. Rooney survives and stumbles back to McCarthy's with Kelly's gun. The one in the poster that suggests Rooney carries it with him all the time, being a hired killer or something. The ending minute leaves the story unresolved but it does not take a certified master mechanic to figure out one.

Note: The studio prop car's “driving” sequences are pretty funny during their shortcut's dusty escape. The studio's stunt driver and sound department put on an impressive show, however. Rooney's faking of the prop car steering wheel suggests he understands and respects the car's limits. He supposedly hits 100 mph at one point with Kelly hanging on for dear life in the back seat as the rear-projected scenery swifts abruptly left to right, tires squealing in the dirt. Not as wacky as W.C. Fields' climactic driving in The Bank Dick, but nonetheless, amusing.

DOUBLE DEAL (1950)

This is the first picture produced by Bel-Air Productions, a studio known for B-movies and location shooting to retain a low budget. There is nothing unique here. Even the film's title was used before and since. There is the usual frame-up, someone getting beat up yet nothing ever heats up. Richard Denning is easy to like and adds the only spark to this clichèd drama. Marie Windsor receives top billing, in a role against type as a decent soul. Still, it is a pretty enjoyable romp thanks to a talented cast including a smarty-hurdy-gurdy monkey.

Out-of-work engineer Denning, is looking for a job in Oklahoma oil country. Thinking he might at least triple his nine dollars, he joins a backroom gambling table after meeting hostess, Windsor. James Griffith wins most of the time because his dice are loaded. After losing, Denning calmly walks over and removes his nine bucks from Griffith's pile of cash. Windsor and her boss take notice of his bold move and learning of his engineering background, they hope to persuade him to help her boss's oil well turn a profit before it defaults to his sister, and Griffith's girl, Fay Baker, as per their father's will. Baker is a manipulator by profession and there is no love lost between her brother. Using all her feminine wiles, she tries to get Denning to change sides. Griffith and Baker stoop low enough to make her will a reality, setting up Denning to take a murder rap. 

No sooner than Baker can say, "My will be done," she is shot and killed by, apparently, the cameraman, as the audience is left to guess who pulled the trigger. Thanks to the monkey's ninja move, Windsor's life is spared from any remaining bullets. The instantly sober attorney was planning to eliminate all family members, claiming the well for himself. Never trust a fake drunk. Windsor gushes over Denning as their oil well strikes a pose.

Note: Taylor Holmes plays the attorney who represented the father before he died. He lives with a talented, unemployed organ grinder monkey. His character is annoying for his perpetual drunk routine. Since the beginning of Hollywood's double standards, stumbling drunks have been either harmless, lovable creatures or used for comic relief. In reality, alcoholics are pathetically in need of help. Even television's Otis Campbell. 

THE LAS VEGAS STORY (1952)

Howard Hughes puts his trademarks on this eighty-eight-minute RKO Radio Pictures film, what with the flying sequences and microscopic closeups of his leading lady. A film that is hardly unknown, it lost money at the box office. However, with the pairing of Victor Mature and Jane Russell, it is hard to ignore. Despite some inferior projects, Mature never embarrassed himself. He is his usual flawless self, yet his co-star, Vincent Price, takes a back seat to no one. Throw in Hoagy Carmichael and you have the potential for fine entertainment. It was directed by Robert Stevenson and required the trio of Robert Sparks, Howard Hughes, and Samuel Bischoff to produce it.

With similar “dangerous” facial features, testy pout, and a noteworthy sneer, Russell may remind one of the female Elvis. She could hardly be called flat except for her adequate acting and one-dimensional delivery here. Her eyes are generally expressionless and her potentially witty comebacks are not as pointed as in the superior, His Kind of Woman, a year earlier, with Robert Mitchum. Nonetheless, she had one of the most beautiful smiles in Hollywood. But lately, those smiles only happen when she is around Happy, played by Carmichael, the casino pianist. Thanks to his delivery, he lightens the film considerably, if not frequently. His opening narration sets up the background for the film's stars prior to their appearance. Hoagy's folksy tone of a “country cool cat” is endearing. He performs an early “rap” song, “The Monkey Song.” The difference with his rap is that he uses an actual melody. The 1938 song, “I Get Along Without You Very Well” is reused for this film. Russell is filmed only from the waist up while singing, providing another comparison to Elvis. But with Hughe's opposite intentions.

Russell's husband, Price, insists on vacationing in Las Vegas, determined to play the tables in hopes of winning enough to pay his debts. He is decidedly a character with selfish motives. Russell preferred a flight anywhere else from fears of running into her old flame, Mature, now a lieutenant with the Sheriff's Department. Throughout most of the film, he and Russell get along without each other very well due to their parting years before, the result of poor communication skills. Russell's 100 grand necklace becomes Price's gambling collateral with the casino owner attempting to secure it. Getting off the same flight as the newlyweds is "Mr. Smarmy" himself, Brad Dexter. He has been assigned by his insurance company to watch Price and Russell's...uh...necklace. Dexter slimes toward the dark side about halfway through the film.

The climax, filmed at the former Tonopah Army Airfield, was the first car and helicopter chase sequence in a movie. Flying twice through an open hanger was a groundbreaking sequence and I imagine amazed the audience. Dexter's useless driving around in circles in his attempt to evade the helicopter is pretty silly. The foot chase between him and Mature is a high-wind final confrontation yet typical of the era. Price is no longer a murder suspect but is found guilty of embezzlement to please the audience. An appropriate wrap to the film. But wait. It is not quite over. After two murders, theft, and an extended chase scene, one might not expect to have another song thrown in. Written for this film and Mature's character, “My Resistance Is Low” is an okay Carmichael song but hard to sit through because of Russell's syrupy delivery and slurred esses. I digress. There will be divorce papers to sign and assuming they can keep their personal blowups restrained, Russell and Mature may roll the dice one more time. Viva Las Vegas!