| Product: |
The Dukes of Hazzard - Unseen (DVD) |
| Date: |
12.12.06 (158 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Great stunts, chases and those short shorts
Disadvantages: Acting is not that great, limited audience appeal
Yee hah! Those southern rebels, relics of a bygone age even in the 1970’s are back again, and you wouldn’t know any time had passed since we last saw their Confederate flag decorated car, General Lee, back in the late 70’s/early 80’s.
Bo & Luke Duke (Seann William Scott & Johnny Knoxville) are cousins, they are also rip roaring, happy go lucky guys with a healthy disrespect for the law, mainly because Boss Hogg (Burt Reynolds), the mayor of Hazzard, is not exactly a citizen of good standing himself and Sheriff Roscoe P Coltrane is hip deep in his pocket. Hogg and Coltrane are more than likely to be involved in more devious criminal escapades than Bo & Luke themselves, whose main crimes are the delivering of moonshine made by their Uncle Jesse (Willie Nelson) and completely ignoring any rules of the road, they drive at very high speeds both on and off the road. Mischief is the name of their game and they are masters at it.
The main story of Dukes of Hazzard, revolving around cars, stunts, fast driving, very short shorts on Cousin Daisy Duke (Jessica Simpson), cars, crashes and car racing (notice the recurring theme of the film yet?), is that of the upcoming Hazzard road rally. Bo is the four time winner of it and this year he has to take on an ex Hazzard county boy, and now pro racer, Billy Prickett. Prickett is also a four-time winner of the rally and has come back to Hazzard just to race in the rally. Meanwhile Boss Hogg is up to some underhand tricks to steal land and property and is doing everything he can to increase his own personal fortune to the detriment of the good citizens of Hazzard county.
Bo & Luke, with a lot of help from Daisy and her skimpy clothes need to find out what Boss Hogg is up to, stop him, win the race and get the girls if they can, it could be a tall order for those Good Old Boys!
To be honest the plot means nothing, it is just something used to string together all the aforementioned car stunts, crashes and chases, but then what else would you expect from a Dukes of Hazzard film. No one who goes to see this will come out disappointed because you know exactly what you are going to get.
Sure it has no redeeming qualities at all but again what would you expect?
It is a guys’ film out and out, there isn’t even any good-looking guys that may just attract the attention of the women. Dukes does contain everything a teenage boy, or an adult that hasn’t grown up yet, would love to see.
I find it amazing that the critics have given Dukes such a pasting, what is wrong with them? It is not aimed at them, or people like me either for that matter! I found it to be very average but can also appreciate that I am not it’s core audience, and that the audience it is aimed at will just love it’s mix of action, comedy and Simpson’s bare flesh (well okay I will admit that she looked damned good in those Daisy Duke shorts!)
The stunts are incredible and come thick and fast throughout the film, and manage to do this with a fair bit of flair and without making it all become too samey. It does give you a kind of thrill seeing these cars flying through the air time after time.
Where it all falls down though is the acting. Scott is good, well as good as you can be in a film where the cars take centre stage, but is reverting back to a ‘type’ here. Being more like his early roles in American Pie and Road Trip than his subtle advancements of his character in Welcome to The Jungle and Bulletproof Monk. Knoxville and Simpson though would be thrown out of an audition for Crossroads! This film doesn’t require much acting talent but even so showing some aptitude for it would be useful.
Knoxville spends his time grinning inanely, chatting up women and shouting at Bo, though he does have the best non-car stunt which involve him and a safe. Other than that he is given little else to do, either because he cannot act or the script doesn’t demand any acting at all He doesn’t do anything to make you like his character and it is only because the two bad guys are so good that you side with the Dukes.
One of Daisy Dukes tells you exactly her part in the film, at one point she says “Gonna have to shake my ass at somebody to get them (Bo & Luke) out”. Substitute ‘somebody’ with ‘the viewers’ and you have Daisy Dukes role to a tee, though it does have to be said that she shows no more flesh than Catherine Bach, the original DD, did in the TV series. She looks good and but has so little to do that her character isn’t developed ion any way at all other than to be eye candy.
Burt Reynolds plays Boss Hogg with a knowing smile and glint in his eye. He is having a ball in this film and as lightweight comedy is what he is best at he stands head ands shoulders above the main cast. This is a wonderful performance from a fine actor.
Then you have Willie Nelson as Uncle Jesse, he is a big loss as he spends most of his on screen time cracking pathetic one liners, but that is the scripts fault not his.
The most surprising of the guest stars is Lynda Carter, star of another 70’s TV series Wonder Woman, who looks as if she has hardly aged over the last 30 years!
Jay Chandrasekhar, the director, is best known for the truly awful Super Troopers and Club Dread, so at least he is making an upwards move with this film. He certainly can film a good chase scenes and a good stunt. Dukes looks good throughout and you cannot fault his direction at all. He even manages to incorporate those wonderful freeze frames from the series where the narrator talks over the frozen scene to explain a few things, that was original back then and still is now, I really enjoyed seeing that particular trick again.
He has made a good action comedy and is perfect viewing for the teenage boys in us all!
Rating: 12A
Running Time: 106 minutes of fuel charged, adrenaline filled car focused action
This is a film only review.
Summary: A film very similar to the TV series
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