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Watching driver’s-ed movies is like watching figure skating: you’re always waiting for the crash. A phalanx of baby-boomers came of age watching these gruesome films with footage of real accidents — some fatal, all gory — intended to scare teens into safe driving. In his sober and sobering documentary, Bret Wood examines this slice of pop culture. He focuses on the Highway Safety Foundation, the Mansfield (Ohio) outfit that produced many of the driver’s-ed movies. Talking-heads interviews with members of the HSF film crew, the Mansfield police chief, and film archivists are interspersed with clips from the likes of Mechanized Death and Wheels of Tragedy. Images of brains pouring out of skulls, limbs at rag-doll angles, and a dead baby are graphic and disconcerting in their small-town authenticity. Wood follows the company’s progression from driving films to police-training videos, with bizarre turns involving gay-sex footage, alleged murders, a failed telethon with Sammy Davis Jr., and rumors of pornos shot on the HSF bus. Although not without humor, Hell’s Highway resists the high-camp route, instead raising compelling questions about the scared-straight strategy and the pornography of violence. David Cronenberg’s Crash is conspicuously avoided. (90 minutes)
BY NINA MACLAUGHLIN
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