Smokey and the Hotwire Gang (1979)

Wretched nonsense involving criminals, hookers, and truckers, Smokey and the Hotwire Gang is passable only as the cinematic equivalent of background noise—it contains just enough action, lowbrow humor, and sex to hold the attention of undemanding viewers so long as they’re doing something else while the movie is running. The discombobulated plot seems to have two major elements. In one, amiable rednecks Filbert (Tony Lorea) and Joshua (James Keach) share criminal misadventures, mostly to do with stealing vehicles. In the other major element, a madam nicknamed “Hotwire” (Carla Ziegfeld) augments her skin-trade income by selling stolen cars. There’s also some sleazy business involving two prostitutes who prowl the countryside in a tricked-out, cowboy-themed Winnebego they call “The Westerner” while offering their services to truckers via CB radio and using the handles “Sexy Sadie” and “Sweet Cakes.” Eventually, all of these things coalesce during a shabby attempt at a madcap finale, because Smokey and the Hotwire Gang is supposed to be a comedy. No matter the genre, the picture is chaotic, disoriented, and sloppy. The movie also looks and sounds awful, thanks to grungy cinematography, jumpy editing, and a rotten soundtrack combining bad country tunes with even worse disco songs. Adding insult to injury, the flick is so tame it bears a PG rating, meaning that anyone looking for cheap thrills during the prostitution scenes will be disappointed. About the only fleetingly enjoyable things in Smokey and the Hotwire Gang are snippets of weird dialogue, as when a trucker identifies himself as “Texas Levy, the Kosher Cowboy,” or when a redneck exclaims, “I haven’t seen anything take off like that since that kid put acid on a cat’s ass.”

Smokey and the Hotwire Gang: LAME

1980 Week: The Long Riders

          Offering a sweeping view of the Jesse James story that includes the thorny relationship between brothers Frank and Jesse James and their longtime comrades-in-arms, the Younger brothers, The Long Riders is exquisitely rendered on many levels, with crisp direction by Walter Hill, luminous photography by Ric Waite, and a plaintive score by Ry Cooder. The movie is best known for its cast, featuring four sets of real-life brothers. James and Stacy Keach play Jesse and Frank James, respectively; David, Keith, and Robert Carradine play the Youngers; Dennis and Randy Quaid play the Millers, two members of the James-Younger Gang; and Christopher and Nicholas Guest play the Fords, two unsavory wannabes whose association with the gang has tragic consequences. (At various stages in the project’s development, participation by Beau and Jeff Bridges and by Timothy Bottoms and his acting brothers was discussed.)

          Except perhaps for one unnecessarily long action scene featuring David Carradine—who was the cast’s biggest star at the time of filming—the stunt casting works beautifully, because the actors bring a natural rapport that suits the narrative. Oddly, however, the film rarely lingers on scenes of the gang members interacting as a group, with the obvious exception of elaborate robbery sequences. Rather, the picture mostly spotlights two-character scenes, such as long vignettes dramatizing the doomed romance between swaggering Cole Younger (David Carradine) and tough-as-nails prostitute Belle Starr (Pamela Reed). Wasn’t the point of casting so many famous brothers to create massive, Magnificent Seven-style scenes in which everyone onscreen is famous and interesting?

          In any event, The Long Riders is consistently entertaining, even though the storyline meanders in frustrating ways. Directing his first Western, Hill shows a remarkable flair for the genre, using long lenses and judiciously selected slow motion to create a poetic sense of place. Whether he’s filming a weathered barn in the middle of a forest or a dusty street running through a grubby frontier town, Hill surrounds his performers with atmosphere. He also films action with his usual consummate skill, so every bullet means something and every horse fall has bone-crunching impact. (The climactic shootout in Northfield, Minnesota, is truly spectacular.) Had the script been stronger, The Long Riders could have become a masterpiece instead of a solid attempt at mythmaking. Unfortunately, the screenplay is a hodgepodge, favoring unimportant elements over important ones.

          James Keach, who has enjoyed a long career in front of and behind the camera without ever becoming a marquee name, developed the piece with an eye toward costarring with his more successful sibling, Stacy. (Both Keaches are credited as cowriters and coproducers.) Yet instead of following the obvious path, having Stacy play the starring role of Jesse, the brothers installed James in the leading role, presumably to create a star-making moment. This choice hurt the movie, because while Stacy’s charismatic intensity burns like a bright candle in the background, the less expressive James sets a reserved tone. David Carradine nearly steals the movie, since he gets most of the best lines and scenes, and some of the film’s excellent players (notably Keith Carradine and Dennis Quaid) are badly underused. Nonetheless, the many fine attributes of The Long Riders make watching the movie a rewarding experience.

The Long Riders: GROOVY

Cannonball! (1976)

          Despite an inconsistent tone that wobbles between action, comedy, drama, and social satire, the car-race flick Cannonball! is periodically entertaining. As cowritten and directed by Paul Bartel—whose previous film, Death Race 2000 (1975), provided a more extreme take on similar material—the picture tries to capture the chaotic fun of the real-life Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash, an illegal trek from New York to L.A. that attracted speed-limit-averse rebels for several years in the ‘70s. (In Cannonball!, the race is reversed, starting in Santa Monica and ending in Manhattan.) Bearing all the hallmarks of a Roger Corman enterprise (the picture was distributed by Corman’s company, New World), Cannonball! has a strong sadistic streak, seeing as how the plot is riddled with beatings, explosions, murders, and, of course, myriad car crashes. Yet while Death Race 2000 employed a body count to make a sardonic point, Cannonball! offers destruction for destruction’s sake. Shallow characterizations exacerbate the tonal variations, so the whole thing ends up feeling pointless. That said, Bartel and his collaborators achieve the desired frenetic pace, some of the vignettes are amusingly strange, and the movie boasts a colorful cast of B-movie stalwarts.

          David Carradine, who also starred in Death Race 2000, stars as Coy “Cannonball” Buckman, a onetime top racer who landed in prison following a car wreck that left a passenger dead. Eager for redemption—and the race’s $100,000 prize—Coy enters the competition alongside such peculiar characters as Perman Waters (Gerrit Graham), a country singer who tries to conduct live broadcasts while riding in a car driven by maniacal redneck Cade Redman (Bill McKinney); Sandy Harris (Mary Woronov), leader of a trio of sexpots who use their wiles to get out of speeding tickets; Terry McMillan (Carl Gottlieb), a suburban dad who has his car flown cross-country in a brazen attempt to steal the first-place prize; and Wolf Messer (James Keach), a German racing champ determined to smite his American counterparts. Some racers play fair, while others employ sabotage, trickery, and violence.

          Carradine is appealing, even if his martial-arts scenes seem a bit out of place, while Bartel (who also acts in the picture), Graham, McKinney, and Dick Miller give funny supporting turns. Thanks to its abundance of characters and events, Cannonball! is never boring, per se, but it’s also never especially engaging. Additionally, much of the picture’s novelty value—at least for contemporary viewers—relates to cinematic trivia. Cannonball! was the first of four pictures inspired by the real-life Cannonball race, since it was followed by The Gumball Rally (also released in 1976), The Cannonball Run (1981), and Cannonball Run II (1984). Providing more fodder for movie nerds, Bartel cast several noteworthy figures in cameo roles, including Sylvester Stallone (another holdover from Death Race 2000), Corman, and directors Allan Arkush, Joe Dante, and Martin Scorsese.

Cannonball!: FUNKY

Sunburst (1975)

Even by the low standards of evil-redneck flicks, Sunburst is atrocious. Dull, terribly acted, and tonally schizophrenic, the picture is more than halfway over before anything of significance happens, and even the introduction of an actual plot is insufficient to generate interest. The picture begins on a college campus, where wholesome coed Jenny (Kathy Baumann) hooks up with sensitive stud Robert (Peter Hooten). The couple travels to the mountains to visit a pal, Michael, who quit school for a simpler life in the wilderness. And that, more or less, is the first 40 minutes of the movie, which comprises one uneventful scene after another, interspersed with montages set to fruity ballads. (And let’s not forget the pointless sequence featuring ’30s crooner Rudy Vallee as a shopkeeper whom the young lovers encounter.) Eventually, while Jenny and Robert take a romantic skinny-dip in a mountaintop lake, they’re spotted by a pair of mouth-breathers (played by James Keach and David Pritchard) who speak to Jenny and Robert and strongly imply threats of sexual violence. Demonstrating spectacular stupidity, the heroes head to Michael’s seemingly abandoned cabin, rather than fleeing to someplace safe, and spend the night screwing. Sure enough, the rednecks show up with knives to beat the crap out of Robert and rape Jenny. The next morning, Michael (played by a very young Robert Englund) finally appears. The future Freddy Krueger must summon a straight face for insipid speeches like this one, appraising Jenny’s post-assault mood: “She’s doing the right thing. She’s putting it together for herself without words. She’s just into herself.” Yeesh. Onetime Miss Ohio Baumann is sexy but vapid, Hooten’s spacey look makes him seem detached, and Keach and Pritchard deliver cartoonish performances. (Sample Keach dialogue: “I suggest that you go right over there in those bushes and wizzle your lizard!”) Whether in its original form or its ’80s video incarnation (bearing the alternate title Slashed Dreams), this flick is to be avoided at all costs.

Sunburst: SQUARE