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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
"Scoot down the road, what's my number? I wonder how your engine feels", September 29, 2010
The outstanding jazz-flavored score for HOT ROD GIRL is by Alexander Courage, best known as composer of the theme and incidental music for "classic" STAR TREK. His 17 piece band includes Bud Shank, Georgie Auld and Dave Pell on saxes, Maynard Ferguson's trumpet, guitarist Barney Kessel and Milt Holland on drums.
In a simple but effective story, Ben Martin (Connors) is a cop who convinces young road racers to exercise their lead feet and exorcise their speed demons at the San Fernando drag strip. Bronc Talbott (Andrews) is the black leather jacketed villain, a hot rodder with a long record of moving violations who gets his kicks goading naïve kids into street heats and "chicken" races.
Early on we see Jeff Northrup's brother Steve (Erickson) get into a street race with a joker who rams his front bumper a couple of times to anger him. Despite pleas from Jeff (Smith) to slow down, Steve wipes out and dies at the scene. Jeff is inconsolable; he works day and night at his mechanic's job for distraction.
After Bronc and his rod breeze into town his first target is class clown Flat Top (Gorshin); their 'chicken' run nearly ends in the joke being on Flat Top.
The still grieving Jeff declines Bronc's best efforts to engage him in a race, but that comes to an end on a sinuous hillside road outside of town. Their cars jockey for position. Just as Jeff crosses onto the wrong side of the street and rounds a curve he sees a boy on a bicycle who's coming right at him.
Despite a misleading title (Lori Nelson's role is a minor one), this interesting and underrated movie has good dialogue, fine music and is competently paced, directed and filmed.
Parenthetical number preceding title is a 1 to 10 imdb viewer poll rating.
(5.1) Hot Rod Girl (1954) - Lori Nelson/Chuck Connors/John Smith/Mark Andrews/Roxanne Arlen/Frank Gorshin/Fred Essler/Eddie Ryder/Carolyn Kearney/Del Erickson/Russell Thorson/Dabbs Greer
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
"Scoot down the road, what's my number? I wonder how your engine feels", September 29, 2010
This 1986 GOODTIMES videotape is recorded at LP speed and only has a linear soundtrack (no HiFi). Picture quality's slightly degraded, the film itself is unrestored and tracking is adequate, typical of slower speed mass-produced tapes.
The outstanding jazz-flavored score for HOT ROD GIRL is by Alexander Courage, best known as composer of the theme and incidental music for "classic" STAR TREK. His 17 piece band includes Bud Shank, Georgie Auld and Dave Pell on saxes, Maynard Ferguson's trumpet, guitarist Barney Kessel and Milt Holland on drums.
In a simple but effective story, Ben Martin (Connors) is a cop who convinces young road racers to exercise their lead feet and exorcise their speed demons at the San Francisco drag strip. Bronc Talbott (Andrews) is the black leather jacketed villain, a hot rodder with a long record of moving violations who comes to town and goads naïve kids into street heats and "chicken" races.
His first victim is Jeff Northrup's brother, Steve (Erickson). Bronc rams Steve's front bumper a couple of times and succeeds in getting him to race, despite pleas from Jeff (Smith) to slow down. Steve wipes out and dies at the scene. Jeff is inconsolable; he works day and night at his mechanic's job for distraction.
Bronc's next target is class clown Flat Top (Gorshin); their 'chicken' run nearly ends in the joke being on Flat Top. Throughout all this, Jeff declines the bully's challenges and best efforts to engage him in a race, but that comes to an end on a sinuous hillside road outside of town. Their cars jockey for position. Just as Jeff crosses onto the wrong side of the street and rounds a curve he sees a boy on a bicycle who's coming right at him.
Despite a misleading title (Lori Nelson's role is a minor one), this interesting and underrated movie has good dialogue, fine music and is competently paced, directed and filmed.
Parenthetical number preceding title is a 1 to 10 imdb viewer poll rating.
(5.1) Hot Rod Girl (1954) - Lori Nelson/Chuck Connors/John Smith/Mark Andrews/Roxanne Arlen/Frank Gorshin/Fred Essler/Eddie Ryder/Carolyn Kearney/Del Erickson/Russell Thorson/Dabbs Greer
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Hot Rod Fun!, November 27, 2010
Luv this movie, even with all it's cracks & scratches on the film, I enjoyed watching the Hot Rods, cast, & the cheesy dialogue, I like the era it took place the 50's. I'm a 50's movie buff about Hot Rods & early Rock n Roll Rebels Rockabilly type. One of the young characters looks like the guy who later became known as the Riddler in the original 60's Batman series. It's a fun movie to watch.
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