Die Todeskurve

Mickey Rooney gets a character well-suited to his abilities, and the good atmosphere at garages and auto racing tracks also helps make this a solid B-melodrama. The story follows a familiar pattern, but the setting is different enough to make it interesting.

Rooney plays the son of a race driver who wants to establish a racing career of his own. The character goes through a number of changes as his fortunes ebb and flow, and Rooney makes him believable at each stage. He had the ability to be sympathetic when necessary, and he also had the knack of making a character turn abrasive in a believable fashion. Here, it helps to flesh out a familiar plot.

Most of the other characters are one-dimensional, and are only there to give Rooney something to play off of. An exception is Thomas Mitchell, whose skill at playing seemingly simple roles makes the garage owner into a believable character in his own right.

The auto racing settings are interesting, and although the racing sequences rely on stock footage, they are still enjoyable. The story takes Rooney's character from hot rods to midget racers to the Indianapolis-style cars. It was set in what was then the present, and race fans in its audiences probably could have spotted some familiar cars. Now, it is also of interest as a decent recreation of the Indy racers of its day.

Not a bad film... the three central characters are played by talented, convincing actors. The plot focus is on Mickey Rooney's character Bill Coy who follows in his father's footsteps for good and for bad. No other characters are developed- all the emotion and story energy is on the cocky, proud star racer/mechanic who does some mellowing under life's hard knocks... the final indy race is an exciting high-point in the action. This picture recently became available on DVD in a MADACY Mickey Rooney Triple Feature Movie Marathon series...

A look at the world of Grand Prix auto racing concerning about Billy (Mickey Rooney) , a young man bursting with raw energy and talent , he is hired by a garage owner named Carrell (Thomas Mitchell) as a mechanic . But Billy gets employment as a speedcar driver and quickly slipping in the rankings . He must learn to deal with his partners and he gets Indianapolis car race where his dad died long time ago . Meanwhile , he is emotionally involvement with attractive girls (Mary Hatcher, Alicia Romay) .

This is a tale of speed and love where Rooney battles competitions , he has his own demons including a horrific , nearly deadly crashing where dies a pilot , being he blamed , besides the mummy fears his death . Car crashes abound and Rooney tempers flaring . There appears uncredited Denver Pyle , Monte Blue and Hattie McDaniel's last movie . The film is developed in top competitors circle , the world's most famous racing circuits as Daiton , Culver city and of course the home of ¨500 miles Indianapolis¨ . It's almost all over the road . The movie belongs to car racing sub-genre with numerous known titles as ¨Grand Prix¨ (by John Frankheimer) ; ¨Le Mans¨ (Lee H Kazkin) in which Steve McQueen does his own driving ; ¨Winning¨ (James Goldstone) where Paul Newman does equally his own driving ; ¨Days of Thunder¨ with Tom Cruise and ¨Driven¨ (Renny Harlin) . Here Mickey Rooney doesn't drive but there are documentary style race footage . The motion picture was well directed by Edward Ludwing . The flick is strictly for those who like cars racing round and round although nowadays dated ; including a brief drama and a good acting by Mickey Rooney .

Mickey Rooney's first film after leaving MGM was this independent production for United Artists, The Big Wheel. This is a racetrack story done with hardly the budget of Le Mans or Grand Prix or even MGM's racing story To Please A Lady that Clark Gable did with Barbara Stanwyck two years later. Still it has a nice cast with good ___location shooting at various racetracks climaxing of course with Indianapolis 500.

The Mick's got a lot to prove, he's the son of a racing legend who lived a fast life, died at the Indianapolis 500 and left widow Spring Byington to raise Mickey by herself. She's had of late though Thomas Mitchell who was her husband's old mechanic and he's now courting Byington.

Because of his attitude Rooney doesn't win many friends at the racing circuit. When Steve Brodie is killed, a lot of the drivers especially Michael O'Shea blame Rooney. And it comes out a lot of them disliked his father for some of the same personality traits and more.

Mickey's got two girls in this one, Mary Hatcher daughter of race car owner Richard Lane and sultry singer Lina Romay. He has to the end of the picture to figure out which one is really in his corner.

The Big Wheel is not a great picture, but it was better than some of what Rooney was doing after World War II at MGM. For the most part they still saw him as a kid over there. The Big Wheel let Mickey Rooney grow up and for that it should be considered a milestone film in his career.

In this one, Mickey Rooney reunites with two of his "Andy Hardy" series castmates: Spring Byington who played his mother there as Mrs. Emily Hardy in the first entry-A Family Affair-and plays his mother here as well. And Lina Romay who was in Love Laughs at Andy Hardy singing a couple of songs there and sings one here as well as also dance with Mickey here as she did in that Hardy movie a few years before. It also has a couple of stars from Gone with the Wind: Hattie McDaniel whose last feature film appearance this was for her and Thomas Mitchell who, as I always like to cite in these reviews, was also in my favorite movie-It's a Wonderful Life. I'll just now say this was quite an entertaining racing picture. Oh, and the leading lady is a Mary Hatcher whose mostly dressed as a mechanic with a cap covering her head but in one scene, she's dressed glamorously thinking she's on a real date with Rooney but the latter was thinking of something work-related during that time!