Shake Hands With Danger

This industrial safety film produced by Caterpillar, the world's leading manufacturer of construction and earth moving equipment, in conjunction with the National Safety Council was made by the writer-director team of the cult classic Carnival of Souls (1962). Made at the tail end of the CB radio era, Shake Hands with Danger (1980) kicks off with a Jerry Reed-style redneck vocal warning all shortcut-takers of the hazards of not following proper procedure. (It is worth remembering that Carnival of Souls' existential journey-to-self began with an ill-advised drag race, leading to a fatal auto accident.) "When the body's on the job but the mind is elsewhere, it's Danger Time" croons narrator Charles Oldfather over a series of cautionary vignettes in which greenhorn and seasoned workmen alike fall victim to inattention and carelessness. Though not on par for gruesomeness with the "red asphalt" driver safety films of the 60s and 70s, or such YouTube geek show classics as Forklift Driver Klaus: The First Day on the Job (2000), Shake Hands with Danger includes several cringe-inducing moments, as when a machinist loses fingers to an unfortunate encounter with a grinding wheel or a man his right arm when he attempts to lubricate a bulldozer bucket pinhole the fast way while the machine is powered on. Shot at a Pittsburgh, Kansas, coal mine with Hollywood stuntmen taking the falls (and fireballs), Shake Hands with Danger is disarmingly timeless and those who disregard it as kitsch do so at their own peril. By Richard Harland Smith