Roaring Roads

I hadn't heard of this movie until recently. I've been on a Little Rascals (or Our Gang) binge recently and when I viewed the Miss Crabtree shorts, I looked up June Marlowe on this site to see if she had made any movies after her stint as that teacher on the series and this one was listed. The fact that former Our Gangers Mickey Daniels and Mary Kornman were also in it whet my appetite as well. Well, I've finally seen this one and the June Marlowe who appeared wasn't Miss Crabtree at all just a brash singer who wasn't so bad during the dance sequence. Oh, and I just found out the star of this movie was one Dave Sharpe who was a stuntman for Hal Roach Studios (he did those backflips for Margaret Mann's Grandma in Fly My Kite) and also was one of the players in The Boy Friends series for Roach which also starred Mickey and Mary. Anyway, this was quite a funny movie not only for those stunts Dave did but also for some dialogue exchanges between Mickey and Mary (and look, he finally got that kiss from her after persisting throughout Fish Hooky a few years back!). And yes, he does that familiar laugh he often did during the talkie era. So on that note, Roaring Roads is worth a look if you're curious enough as I was...P.S. Sharpe also did the story as D.H. Sharpe

Film shows the empty roads of 1935 America and an improbable plot with some slapstick comedy.

Set in sunny small town or suburb wit dirt road and old houses.

The racing shows some gorgeous sprint cars and some racing on a banked dirt oval that I can't identify.

Heroine's car is labelled McDowell Special and in one scene it can be seen it has a weird intake system presumably because McDowell was a man making speed parts for the Ford Model A engine.

Practically identical cars have been sold in UK in 2022.

The film is panned by many youngsters who cannot appreciate the naievity of cheap 1930's films and unknown actors.

No-name actor David Sharpe plays a rich teen who is sick of being sheltered and over-protected. It seems he's the heir to a family fortune and his guardians are scared to death something bad could happen to him. So, he naturally feels smothered. It's so bad, he eventually runs away--looking for some excitement in his very dull existence. Through some VERY, VERY, VERY contrived situations, he soon meets up with a girl who asks him (completely out of the blue) to drive her race car in 'the big race'. I am sure this sort of thing happened all the time back in the 1930s!! Can David win the race, avoid killing himself and get the girl by the time the movie is complete....all in under one hour? And, can he do it when an evil baddie is conspiring behind the scenes to make sure David can't win?!

This movie has 'Poverty Row' written all over it. In other words, William Berke Productions had a minuscule budget and it clearly shows! Most of the actors are obviously non-professionals, as their delivery is very poor. Some stumble over their words, have flat deliveries or even talk over other actors. And, because it was a very quickly made B-movie, the director didn't even bother re-shooting scenes that were clearly mistakes. In addition, the story is very poorly written--with some bad dialog and silly story elements--with way too many convenient coincidences. So despite all these problems, is it worth seeing? Well, if you are a Mickey Daniels fan (there are at least three or four out there), then it's worth seeing him in his post-Little Rascals/Hal Roach Studiodays. This rather brash actor was in the tail end of his career when he made this film and was forced to appear in very low-end productions like this one. Considering his shtick involved a horrid ear-piercing laugh, I guess this was not a bad thing. Also, if you love absolutely terrible talent shows, then this is the picture for you! Otherwise, I say skip it.

Ill admit it a chuckled at the first scenes of this film not cause of the edits and jumps cuts this film had. Because the first few moments of the film was genially funny and David Sharpies character "dave" (go figure huh) was a funny guy. The plot comes out of no where as dave meets a family and switches car and meets a racer and a mechanic as he joins a race out of no where. Its like the andy hardy writers had an idea scrapped it and gave it to the poverty row studios and independent cinemas to shoot. Now that I think about it this film predates the andy hardy series. Anyways their is literally a scene where dave is driving and you can see the reflection of the director and the camera man lmao!

David Sharpe is going wild. His maiden aunts have kept the rich orphan cooped up to avoid injury. So he takes a car and heads onto the road. He picks up Mickey Daniels, and is almost run over by Gertrude Messinger in a racing car. Her brother, Jack Mulhall, was injured in a suspicious accident by gamblers backing another car. While Daniels canoodles with Mary Kornman, Sharpe gets the car into shape, despite gangsters and two inept guards sent by his aunt.

It's pretty poor movie, co-written by Sharpe and comedy short specialist Charles Rogers, and co-directed by Rogers and horse opera specialist Ray Nazarro. You won't miss much if you don't see it, and it didn't set Sharpe's career on fire. He was born in 1910 and had been in the movies for a dozen years, beginning with a role in Fairbanks' ROBIN HOOD. He would specialize in athletic bits, like playing a swordsman in SINGIN' IN THE RAIN and a lot of stunt doubling -- over 400 movies in all. He would retire after 1978's HEAVEN CAN WAIT and live to be 70.