This felt so standard-issue early on that I didn't think I would end up liking it, but eventually it came around for me. Some of the things that put me off were a generic prison escape and chase by bloodhounds (btw how did he just waltz out of there?), the young women in the town throwing themselves at Burt Reynolds, and a bland car chase ala The Dukes of Hazzard. It all just seemed kind of uninspired and basic.
Where it picked up was in the character of the sheriff (Ned Beatty), a man who controls the town through corruption and his powerful connections. We hear him rationalize taking a cut of the moonshine business this way: "Now what's it the business of any income tax federal revenuer anyway? If Pot Willoughby, any other old moonshiner, wants to come in this office, put down his paper sack full of money, like he's been doing for years, and I take that money and I spread it around among 25 men in my department, who do not make enough off the taxpayer to buy their wives a washer and a dryer machine all them things that every American family's supposed to have."
Almost sounds reasonable right? But eventually we understand just how backward he is, when he says this: "They (the federal government) don't care what we want. They're gonna integrate our schools, they're gonna get all our coloreds to vote. They're gonna send all those long-haired, smart-aleck hippies down here ... Living in Russia, that's you might as well be doing ... Communism, Harvey, that's what it is."
This is a guy who speaks like a good ol' boy to his secretary (Louise Latham, who's wonderful here), but is incredibly cruel, killing protesters of the war, and using his muscle against women and old folks in the town to get information out of them. It's a great character, performed well by Beatty. It's telling that by contrast, Reynold's character has no prejudice, and his father had a black moonshiner for a friend in the 1950's. For a film seemingly geared towards southern audiences, it allows itself some pointed criticism.
The film gets other things right: the feeling of small towns, the feeling of hot, muggy weather, and the location shooting, which are all plusses. There is comedy in the dialogue even in fight scenes (Reynold's insulting another guy by yelling "You super giant ass!" comes to mind). The drama as it unfolds over the final half hour is solid stuff, mixing as it does a harrowing predicament, a stay in the home for unwed (and humorously curious) mothers, and some driving through cornfields. The ending was clever if a little simplistic, and I thought the film was wise to go out as it did.
Where it picked up was in the character of the sheriff (Ned Beatty), a man who controls the town through corruption and his powerful connections. We hear him rationalize taking a cut of the moonshine business this way: "Now what's it the business of any income tax federal revenuer anyway? If Pot Willoughby, any other old moonshiner, wants to come in this office, put down his paper sack full of money, like he's been doing for years, and I take that money and I spread it around among 25 men in my department, who do not make enough off the taxpayer to buy their wives a washer and a dryer machine all them things that every American family's supposed to have."
Almost sounds reasonable right? But eventually we understand just how backward he is, when he says this: "They (the federal government) don't care what we want. They're gonna integrate our schools, they're gonna get all our coloreds to vote. They're gonna send all those long-haired, smart-aleck hippies down here ... Living in Russia, that's you might as well be doing ... Communism, Harvey, that's what it is."
This is a guy who speaks like a good ol' boy to his secretary (Louise Latham, who's wonderful here), but is incredibly cruel, killing protesters of the war, and using his muscle against women and old folks in the town to get information out of them. It's a great character, performed well by Beatty. It's telling that by contrast, Reynold's character has no prejudice, and his father had a black moonshiner for a friend in the 1950's. For a film seemingly geared towards southern audiences, it allows itself some pointed criticism.
The film gets other things right: the feeling of small towns, the feeling of hot, muggy weather, and the location shooting, which are all plusses. There is comedy in the dialogue even in fight scenes (Reynold's insulting another guy by yelling "You super giant ass!" comes to mind). The drama as it unfolds over the final half hour is solid stuff, mixing as it does a harrowing predicament, a stay in the home for unwed (and humorously curious) mothers, and some driving through cornfields. The ending was clever if a little simplistic, and I thought the film was wise to go out as it did.