Monday, August 05, 2019

Movie review - "California Straight Ahead" (1937) **1/2

John Wayne made six non Westerns at Universal, some of which like this one were directed by Arthur Lubin. Wayne is ideal casting as a truck driver in a truckie melodrama - these can made good tough films like They Drive By Night and Hell Drivers. There's staples of the genre - an accident driving nitro, inspirational speeches to workers, races against time, corrupt business practices, determination to prove that trucks are as good as trains.

Due to the low budget there's not a lot of truck driving - it is a Universal film though so there's decent sets and lots of extras and things.

There's some nice touches like Wayne starting off as a school bus driver - two little girls argue over who is going to marry him. It looks innocent, okay!

The female roles aren't much - a woman who loves Wayne harranges him into starting a trucking company then whinges and whines when her stupid brother dies. Her whining mother who just complains constantly and blames Wayne when the idiot son dies. It's not Wayne's fault and they look like fools. I didn't want Wayne to get back with the girl.

They shove in a lot of plot and the production values are decent.

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