Howard Hawks was what used to be known as a ‘man’s man’. He was a sportsman (another defunct term) who raced cars and motorcycles, flew planes, hunted, fished, rode horses, the whole shmeer. His love of flying was well documented in several movies–‘The Dawn Patrol’, ‘Air Force’ and the wonderful ‘Only Angels Have Wings’. The loathsome hunting bit turned up in ‘Hatari’, of course. And then there was the race-car infatuation. In 1932 he made ‘The Crowd Roars’ starring James Cagney and thirty-three years later came ‘Red Line 7000’. Above are the opening credit sequences for both films. ‘The Crowd Roars’ features an unusual (for then) pre-titles sequence unaccompanied by music depicting a racetrack disaster. The later film’s opening also takes place on a race track, with very different (and less interesting) looking cars. I’ve seen the earlier film–it was many years ago–and plan on rewatching it over lunch today. ‘Red Line 7000’ was a famous debacle–a roundly disliked, poorly reviewed film that was considered laughable in its awkward, out-of-keeping-with-the-times staginess. But I wonder; might it look better now then it did then? I’ve not seen it and somehow I doubt I’d make it through the whole thing. Then again George Takei is listed prominently in the credits and how can one not be curious about seeing him in a race-car movie? Note that Hawks takes an unusual credit in the earlier film–‘Story and Direction by’ and also takes the ‘story by’ credit in the latter film, even though each film employed a boatload of screenwriters. One assumes his passion for racing was such that he wanted to handle and control the presentation of the sport with a firm hand. He may have story credit on some of his other films but it’s atypical of him or any other director of the era to take such a credit.And now it’s time for lunch and a pre-code Cagney movie…