The Fast and the Furious

1954

Crime / Drama / Film-Noir / Mystery / Romance / Thriller

5
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 48% · 2 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Spilled 48% · 1K ratings
IMDb Rating 5.3/10 10 1780 1.8K

nurse hostage racing fugitive road movie carjacking

Plot summary

A framed man escapes prison and takes a wealthy woman's Jaguar with her in it. After she tries to escape numerous times, they begin to develop feelings for each other, and enter a road race that ends in Mexico.

Director

John Ireland Photo
John Ireland

Top cast

John Ireland Photo
John Ireland as Frank Webster
Dorothy Malone Photo
Dorothy Malone as Connie Adair
Bruno VeSota Photo
Bruno VeSota as Bob Nielson - Truck Driver
Jonathan Haze Photo
Jonathan Haze as Connie's Rescuer
720p.WEB
667.8 MB
960*720
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
25 fps
1 hr 12 min
Seeds 7

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by planktonrules 5 / 10

Decent, but not what I'd hoped.

John Ireland plays a man who escaped from prison and is trying to make his way to freedom in Mexico. Along the way, he takes a hostage (Dorothy Malone) and steals her car. Most of the movie consists of this journey together to freedom.When I saw that John Ireland starred in this film, I made extra sure to see it as he's one of my favorite "unknown" actors from Hollywood in the 40s and 50s. I love his films because he was a great Film Noir star--kind of ugly and tough--exactly what you'd expect for the genre where "pretty boys" are unwelcome. However, while this film has a few Film Noir qualities (after all, it's about a man wanted for murder), it really isn't exactly Noir and Ireland's character lacks the delicious evilness that I'd hoped to see. While tough and full of snappy dialog, his character is just too likable and the plot too upbeat to be considered Noir by us purists. In addition, having Malone and Ireland fall in love was just wrong--making no sense and thereby damaged the film's sense of realism--something imperative to have in Noir. Plus, all the grainy stock footage of auto races just seemed cheap and out of place. As a result of all these factors, I was very disappointed and so would be other fans of Noir and it's a low budget time-passer and unfortunately not much else.
Reviewed by funkyfry 5 / 10

AIP's first film: let loose the hounds of war!

Surprisingly solid production with an obviously very low budget (this was producer Corman's first film, I believe, and he is true to form). About a man on the run who kidnaps a lovely lady in a sports car. Of course, she falls in love with him when he gives her a picnic. Strictly stock footage and poor rear-projection for the race scenes. Some nice touches in the dialogue. It's actually surprising that this film emerges as watchable, but it even ends up being likeable. Well, it took me years to find it, but I can't say I ever expected it to be any good, so I guess I wasn't disappointed. First film for American International Pictures (then known as American Releasing Corporation or ARC, under the auspices of the infamous Alex Gordon, Jim Nicholson, and Sam Arkoff), whose only producers at that time were Gordon, Corman, and (eventually) Herman Cohen, if I got all the names right. Anyway, as most drive in fans know, these guys changed the world of movies, and I guess this little film is where it all started. Well, fast cars and girls in danger is a good film formula, so I guess they didn't pick a bad place to start off.
Reviewed by FyouGitive 6 / 10

Auto racing plays a part ...

This may be one of very few opportunities to see real racers in real race cars on a real - late and lamented - racetrack. Pebble Beach was an early Mecca for road racing fans, and while there are some discontinuities and incongruous events in the story, some of what is shown on-screen will be of value to motor sport historians, who should be able to identify the drivers and cars. As a novelty, perhaps, but valuable.John Ireland and Dorothy Malone went on to do some creditable work, and are not bad here, but to be honest, they don't have that much to work with. Not entirely a time-waster, at any rate.
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