Ever Seen a Real Rose, Hallie?

Speed (1936)
directed by Edwin L. Marin
rating: 2 out of 5 cravats
on TCM at Syl's

When it’s great, it’s a “gem,” so Speed is a “quickie.” Half promotional documentary for domestic auto factories, half whiny salvo from Gentleman Jim's Hugh Grant head of hair, the movie wanders too much for its running time but eventually settles on a speed race across Utah salt flats to resolve its affairs of the heart. That would be the love between an irate test driver and the president’s daughter, a woman inexplicably receptive to the simultaneous advances of a real asshole of a company engineer. Jimmy Stewart spends most of his time complaining about the “pencil pushers” who have it in for “grease monkeys” like himself, but he’s such a grump about it that it’s difficult to sympathize. In the end, the only one likeable enough to root for is a heartsick female executive, but the overstated implication that her unhappiness is a direct result of her professional success makes for a pretty mean-spirited haul.