FAST COMPANY

US, 1953, 67 minutes, Black and white.
Howard Keel, Polly Bergen, Marjorie Main, Nina Foch, Horace Mc Mahon, Sig Arno.
Directed by John Sturges.

Fast Company is a very slight comedy from MGM, a supporting feature of the early 50s. However, a reason for seeing it is that it is part of the early career of director John Sturges. He had made a number of standard films up till this period but was soon to make Bad Day at Black Rock and move into bigger-budget films like Gunfight at the OK Corral. Within seven years he had made The Magnificent Seven and moved on to other films like The Great Escape. His final film was The Eagle Has Landed.

Regulars at MGM at this period appeared in films like this despite their star status. Howard Keel is enjoyably laidback as a racing trainer. Polly Bergen is the model who inherits a horse which has no value whatsoever but, with shrewdness and incessant talking, is able to get a horse and get it trained, and winning a race. In the background is Marjorie Main doing her variation on Ma Kettle. Nina Foch does her variation on the seductive other woman.

The film is slightly amusing, not a great laugh-out-loud comedy. Howard Keel is able to keep the charm, even as he clashes verbally with Polly Bergen and leaves her under the persuasion of Nina Foch. However, he gets his comeuppance as the heroine triumphs over all her opposition.

Something like a postscript for the career of John Sturges as well as for Howard Keel.