Dukes of Hazzard – The Movie
It’s sleazy; it’s noisy; it’s juvenile.
But it’s rather good fun, nonetheless!
Lets start with
the bad points first. Willie Nelson’s version of Uncle Jesse would make Denver
Pyle turn in his grave. This is a pot-smoking, moonshine drinking, swearing old
outlaw who garners very little audience empathy. His scenes are mercifully
brief,(almost to the point of making his character an
irrelevance) and his sole contribution appears to be that of a rather ribald
comedian. In contrast to Pyle’s interpretation of the character as a gentle
god-fearing bringer of wisdom, Nelson plays the man as a lecherous old wise-cracking
hippy.
Jessica Simpson’s
Daisy is an anaemic character with few lines of dialogue, whose main purpose is
to strip off down to a
Bo and Luke (Sean
William Scott and Johnny Knoxville) are loud, fairly dumb, raucous and pretty
much interchangeable as characters, but their manic charm is actually rather
enjoyable. Yes, these good ol’ boys are not the same
as the Bo and Luke of fond memory, but the actors do at least strive to give
them full-bloodied personalities in their own right and are none-the-worse for
that. Their chemistry together is quite potent and they produce many funny
(predominantly slapstick) moments. It’s juvenile
humour; but, taken on its own, perfectly entertaining.
Burt Reynolds as
Boss is far removed from Sorrel Booke; but, once
again, the fact remains that an actor has every right to make a fictional
character his own and Reynolds does his best with a somewhat under-written part.
I doubt he looked upon this role as anything more than a ‘take the money and
run’ acting job, but he succeeds in making the character amusingly villainous
without being actually threatening. Roscoe is your absolutely bog-standard
sinister corrupt Southern Sheriff (no humour here),and
Enos exists solely for the purpose of swooning once
or twice over Daisy.
Out of all the
characters, only Cooter (after the General) comes
close to the original.
Of the remaining
participants, the Duke’s paranoid friend Sheev is
entertaining and fits nicely within the scenario.
The plot is
essentially the same as that of “Farewell Hazzard”
from the 5th Season. Boss wants to strip-mine Hazzard,
and stages a cross-country road-race at the exact time that an official hearing
is taking place at the Courthouse, thus ensuring that none of the county’s
citizens attend to legally voice their opposition. It’s up to Bo and Luke to
win the race AND make it to the Courthouse on time.
It’s a serviceable
plot for the type of entertainment required and maintains the viewer’s interest
well enough. The strengths of the film are Bo and Luke’s interaction with
one-another; some occasionally inspired physical comedy (The safe surfing
interlude; the masquerade as Japanese scientists) and plenty of robust
automotive action. Indeed, the chase sequences are staged with an
adrenaline-charged frenzy and usually culminate in a typically death-defying
flight of the General Lee.
And there lies the
rub – this is The General’s movie, no doubt about that. He skids, slides,
wheelies, 180’s, 360’s and flies like no other car. Alright, his acrobatics are
fairly unoriginal as car stunts go; but The General is such an iconic image that he really only needed to drive past the camera in
order to get the audience enthusiastic! No other car could make as simple an
action as sliding round a traffic roundabout so exciting, and when he takes to
the skies (there are three really impressive jumps and countless smaller ones)
the films manifold faults just seem to melt away.
Never has that
orange 69 Dodge Charger looked so good!
There are many
fans who will hate this film, and with good justification. It reflects very
poorly on its source material, and its storytelling is hardly inspired.
But looked upon as
a loud, fast-moving, stunt-filled raucous comedy it certainly fits the bill.