Drive a Crooked Road

Eddie Shannon (Mickey Rooney) is a shy master mechanic with a scar across his face from a crash. He finishes second in a car race and two men (Kevin McCarthy, Jack Kelly) take an interest in the loner. Femme fatale Barbara Mathews (Dianne Foster) stops by the garage and every guy's head is turned. She seems to keep coming back to Eddie. In fact, she's trying to recruit him for nefarious purposes. I like the shy Mickey Rooney. It loses a little bit with the melodramatic love. It might be better if Barbara doesn't have second thoughts. It's more compelling with Eddie being taken advantage of. There's no need for the girl to fall for him. It gets a bit overwrought anyways. This is an interesting little crime noir.

Drive A Crooked Road was a great performance by Mr. Mickey Rooney. I'm never ceased to be amazed by this man's talents. As a child I used to watch his films and he always amazed me then and always will. I recently discovered this classic gem and is one of the best performances of Mr. Rooney's. Mickey Rooney always gives a good performance. Mickey Rooney plays an auto mechanic who is framed by the girl he thinks loves him. Mickey Rooney did a lot of great film noir in the 50's. For other great Rooney 1950's performances check out Baby Face Nelson, The Big Operator, The Last Mile (an amazing performance by Rooney.) You will not be disappointed.

Hell hath no fury like a man scorned. Mickey Rooney starts out as if he is a Danny Kaye milque-toast character. Taken in by Diane Foster, he soon meets up with 2 guys who want his driving talent to be used in robbing a bank. Rooney is great here as he goes from a quite guy, afraid of really living to aiding the guys in the heist. Hurt by the betrayal of Foster, she shows compassion at the end and this leads to tragedy as Rooney becomes a killer. This is really film-noir at its very best. The robbery was a complete success but the thieves were done in by personal reactions. This one is worth catching.

As other reviewers point out, America's favorite little guy was at a career crossroads at this point (1953). All in all, this downbeat low-budget caper film was a gutsy choice for MGM's former golden boy. Not only is Rooney's Eddie Shannon a rather pathetically repressed and vulnerable nobody, but the script stays entirely within that character, allowing Rooney none of his usual assertive (and often annoying) antics. The result is perhaps the biggest departure of his career, and also perhaps the most moving. The film itself is a good one, benefiting from unfamiliar Southern Cal locations, excellent acting from a number of up-&-comers, Jack Kelly , Kevin McCarthy, et al., and a plausible script. As a caper film, it's inferior to the best ones of that decade (The Asphalt Jungle, The Killing, etc.), but as an account of one man's sad and lonely plight (never a Hollywood biggie), it holds its own with the best of them, thanks to Rooney.