BEFORE: All 5 Broken Lizard members carry over from last night (some making only cameo appearances, though) - and one of them directed this remake of the 80's TV series. Will it bring back fond memories of my childhood, or just make me feel old? (I'm guessing the latter.)
THE PLOT: Cousins Bo and Luke Duke, with a little help from their cousin Daisy and Uncle Jesse, torment the authorities of Hazzard County, Boss Hogg and Sheriff Coltrane.
AFTER: Any other TV shows from my youth you want to re-vamp, Hollywood? You got to Miami Vice, Charlie's Angels, the Brady Bunch, Bewitched, Get Smart, The A-Team and Fat Albert (OK, so I watched a lot of TV when I was a kid...) So where's "Three's Company" the movie?
I guess I didn't hate this one as much as I thought I might - though I resented the Jackass-ification of the Duke boys, by adding nut shots, crazy stunts and Johnny Knoxville. And they did pack in a lot of story, what with moonshining, a road rally, Boss Hogg's evil plot, and a bunch of the Dukes' ex-girlfriends.
But the only thing Daisy Duke can do is wear her namesake shorts and a bikini top and flirt with police officers? Wait a second, that's not exactly a complaint, plus I think that's all she ever did on the TV show too (the bikini top surfaced during ratings sweeps).
And they did make the villains leaner and meaner - Boss Hogg was famously played on TV by the rotund Sorrell Booke, and here he's slicker and played by Burt Reynolds (last seen in "The Longest Yard"). It's sad to think that he used to play the guy outrunning the cops in "Smokey and the Bandit", though. Sheriff Roscoe seems a lot meaner here too, but even though he seems more competent the plot demands that he end up as ineffectual as ever.
They couldn't get cameos from the original actors? At least the ones that are still alive? I can't believe that Tom Wopat and John Schneider are too busy - jeez, even David Soul and Paul Michael Glaser made cameos in the "Starsky & Hutch" remake...
NITPICK POINT #1: Part of the Dukes' southern charm is lost when their Georgia farmhouse is teched out with James Bond-style hidden rooms that hold their stills.
NITPICK POINT #2: We all know that the General Lee's doors were intentionally welded shut. In this film they don't open because the mechanic didn't have time to make them open - but the default setting for a car door is to be able to open, it shouldn't take a mechanic to make them operable.
Also starring Seann William Scott (last seen in "Role Models"), Willie Nelson, Jessica Simpson, Lynda Carter (last seen in "Sky High"), M.C. Gainey, David Koechner (last seen in "Extract")
RATING: 5 out of 10 armadillos
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