Cannonball Run
What’s wrong with comedies these days? It could be a lack of chemistry amongst their actors, or it could be scripts that are overwritten with certain sensibilities in mind that fall completely flat and settle for being merely somewhat witty instead of funny, or it could be that ALL of the talent involved with these projects have no grasp of any possible concepts that might actually make audiences laugh. Then you look back at 1981 when this film was released and ruthlessly savaged by critics at the time (including Roger Ebert), but yet was a major box office smash and is still remembered as an unsung and undervalued 80s comedy classic. And why? Let’s start with the opening sequence, which features two hot babes in a Lamborghini running a cop car ragged during an extended chase, at one point even stopping so that one of them can get out and spray paint a speed limit sign in a totally unmitigated display of civil disobedience. This was the vision that director Hal Needham brought to the screen at that time, a story about a highly illegal car race from The East Coast to The West Coast (which was a real race in the 70s) that featured a large and colorful cast of characters, including some of the biggest movie stars in the world at that time, and what’s even more significant is the loose, off the cuff attitude of the actors, seemingly making up whole chunks of their characters completely on their own, many of whom wind up brilliantly spoofing their own real life personas and succeeding in coming across as funny and genuine, to the extent that one scene after another literally becomes a competition to see who can steal that scene. It’s a deceptively simple strategy one would think, but one that can only work if the principals themselves actually do have both likability AND talent, and one shudders to think what would occur if many of today’s comic wonders attempted that challenge, only to embarrassingly fall flat on their faces. Leading the pack is Burt Reynolds (the undisputed number one movie star in the world at that time, who pocketed a cool $5 million for the role, which at that point was an industry record) as J.J. McClure, hotshot race car driver and mechanic, who thinks nothing of casually landing an airplane in a small town street to pick up some beer or driving a boat at full speed through the water and making big waves to the other boats nearby. Indeed, in this cinematic world we are presented with, crazy stunts such as this go by unnoticed without the blink of a eye. McClure hits upon the idea of racing The Cannonball in a souped-up ambulance refurbished with a hemi engine, on the idea that no one will interfere with an emergency vehicle while its lights are flashing. Along with him are Dom DeLuise as his best friend, a simple minded type (though a great driver) with a superhero alter ego as the unstoppable Captain Chaos; Jack Elam as a crazed doctor with a penchant for sticking himself with his own needles; and Farrah Fawcett (the number one sex symbol in the world at the time) as the sweet hippie chick who gets caught up with them on the ride and acts as the ambulance’s patient. Among the competition are Roger Moore (the current James Bond at the time) as an insane rich kid who actually believes that he’s James Bond (yep) and drives a souped up Aston Martin in the race with a variety of lady friends; Rat Pack Legends Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. as a couple of unscrupulous types who dress as priests, drive a Ferrari and specialize in dirty tricks (with Dino in particular being completely shit-faced at the START of the race and yet still managing to make it across the country); Adrienne Barbeau and Tara Buckman as the aforementioned Lamborghini babes who use their feminine charm to keep (male) cops from busting their beautiful asses for speeding; Terry Bradshaw and Mel Tillis as a couple of rednecks with the literal gall to use an actual NASCAR vehicle in the race, all while drinking copious amounts of beer along the way; Jackie Chan and Michael Hui as the Japanese entrants, driving a completely computerized car that makes even today’s technology look primitive, yet have no clue how to drive on America’s roads and half the time don’t even know where they’re going; Bert Convy as a rich, corporate CEO type who also happens to be a thrillseeker and reunites with his old buddy Warren Berlinger to race across the country on a Super Chief motorcycle; Jamie Farr as the outrageous, Rolls Royce driving Sheik, whose desire to win the race is only rivaled by his lust for beautiful women; Rick Aviles and Alfie Wise as Mad Dog and Batman, driving a Ford GMC truck and willing to go to any means to win, even if it means taking a short cut through the woods and running over trees on the way; and NFL Legend and the greatest defensive lineman to ever play the game Joe Klecko as a big dumb guy toodling along in the race in a big green van. Add to this George Furth as the weaselly liberal environmentalist trying to stop the race who is subject to all sorts of abuse and humiliation; Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder as the oddsmaker on the race (and antagonist of Sammy’s); and best of all even Peter Fonda himself as the grinning leader of a gang of bikers that cause trouble for the Cannonballers. As you can see there’s a lot on the table, but at a brisk, enjoyable 95 minutes, excellent stunt work on display with all the vehicles, and most of all the breezy, genuinely funny and natural interplay amongst the actors, whether it be Dino and Sammy talking smack with Burt and Dom, the Asians hilariously arguing constantly in Cantonese, or The Lamborghini Babes being as sweet as possible to every cop that pulls them over, it all works and it all flows wonderfully as it portrays a world filled with freedom loving motorheads tearing up America’s highways with an utter disregard for the law. In the end, maybe a movie that’s only beloved by those who saw it growing up, but nonetheless an essential comedy for people to see what it was like in a different (and better) era of filmmaking…
10/10