Wild at the Wheel

Wild at the Wheel (1970)

*** (out of 4)

Sid Davis produced this education film about a teen known as "Speedy" because of how fast he liked to drive his car. At the start of the film they're picking him up off the road after a deadly crash. We then flashback to see why he's dead and how it all could have been prevented had only he followed some simple rules. These driving-safety films can only be judged on their entertainment level and this one here is pretty high. The movie starts off with us seeing the bloody teen and then we flashback to all the typical information about how popular he was, how his younger brother looked up at him and how he only drove fast so people would think he was cool. All of this is done in that campy 70s fashion so one will get quite a few laughs along the way. This here is certainly not an Oscar-winner but there's enough camp to make it worth watching.

This short film from Sid Davis starts with the dead body of Tom "Speedy" Robinson being carried from the crash site. It lays the blame at his father's feet, for his impatient attitude towards other drivers, and his defense of Tom in court for speeding on the grounds that there were real criminals out there.

It's a bit off track for a driver safety movie. Producer Sid Davis was always looking for a different way to tell a story in his movies, and although he usually failed, occasionally he succeeded beyond all belief. Here he doesn't, but it's not awful.

The cars, the way the characters are made up, the music, and the cars mark this clearly in the time it was made.

AS IS THE case with so many movies made by or for local municipalities, this one suffers from being so obviously amateur. Now we don't mean in its production values; but rather in the very reason that it was made.

JUST ABOUT ANY adolescent, be they female or (especially) male, is reluctant to recognize his adult mentors as knowing anything at all worth emulating. We need only look to the quotation from Mark Twain who said something like: "When I was 18 I couldn't believe how stupid my father was. When I reached 21, I was surprised to find out just how much the 'Old Man' had learned!" ALTHOUGH WE MAY seem to be just a trifle cynical, generally speaking*, the kids have to learn their life lessons on their own.

NOTE: * And this is a 5 Star ;general', Schultz!