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Lobby card for The Fast and the Furious |
"When a Wanted Man - Meets a Wanting Woman!"
Roger Corman's career really took off when he negotiated a three picture deal with the company that would become American International Pictures (AIP). In what is sort of a remake of his first picture Highway Dragnet, Corman wrote and Produced (and Directed the Second Unit - and stunt drove!) in a film about Frank Webster (John Ireland) a truck driver wrongly convicted for murder who kidnaps race car driver Connie Adair (Dorothy Malone) and flees the country in her Jaguar XK120 via an international sports car race that crosses the U.S. / Mexico border.
The film suffers from John Ireland splitting his time behind the wheel and behind the camera, and the hokey romance seems to lack any real chemistry. In fact all the finest performances are by the day players in supporting roles. And while it's true Roger Corman would go on to produce better race car films (including Death Race 2000, and Ron Howard's directorial debut, Grand Theft Auto), The Fast and the Furious is worth seeking out because the story itself (one of only a handful Corman wrote in his prodigious producing career) isn't bad, and the race scenes are some of the best that had ever been filmed up to that time.
The film was remade - no, not as the 2001 Paul Walker / Vin Diesel film that purchased the rights to the title - as a 1994 action-comedy starring Charlie Sheen called The Chase.
**1/2 out of *****
The film suffers from John Ireland splitting his time behind the wheel and behind the camera, and the hokey romance seems to lack any real chemistry. In fact all the finest performances are by the day players in supporting roles. And while it's true Roger Corman would go on to produce better race car films (including Death Race 2000, and Ron Howard's directorial debut, Grand Theft Auto), The Fast and the Furious is worth seeking out because the story itself (one of only a handful Corman wrote in his prodigious producing career) isn't bad, and the race scenes are some of the best that had ever been filmed up to that time.
The film was remade - no, not as the 2001 Paul Walker / Vin Diesel film that purchased the rights to the title - as a 1994 action-comedy starring Charlie Sheen called The Chase.
**1/2 out of *****
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