The Dukes of Hazzard

The Dukes of Hazzard - When Sean William Scott is the best actor you have in your film, you know you're in trouble. To begin, let's take a look at the cast for this remake.

Bad ideas for casting:
-Johnny Knoxville as Luke Duke - Not an actor, became famous by hurting himself on MTV's Jackass
-Jessica Simpson as Daisy Duke - Not an actor, famous pop-star singer known for being rather ignorant.
-Burt Reynolds as Boss Hogg - Famous actor from the 60's and 70's that should've stopped acting long ago while he was ahead.
-Willie Nelson as Uncle Jesse - Famous country musician that has been in many movies, but should've stuck to music.
-a whole bunch of Broken Lizard guys which shouldn't have tried to continue on after Super Troopers.

Good ideas for casting:
-Sean William Scott as Bo Duke - Actor who rose to stardom by landing roles in teen comedies, mainly the American Pie series.

As you can see, the casting for this was not well thought out and the film tried banking on big names and fans of the TV show to gain their money. This was pretty obvious, as the film was absolutely terrible and no one would possibly like it for anything besides having a crush on one of the stars or just because they're a die-hard fan of the TV show.

The simple plot of this film involves Boss Hogg trying to buy the land of Hazzard county so he can strip mine it and make some cash. In order to get his strip mining ordinance passed he tries to draw everyone's attention to the big race held in Hazzard county, and once the Dukes find out about this they are determined to thwart his efforts.

This movie was easily one of the hardest films to sit through of the summer, I was struggling to stay in my seat at the half hour mark. While I was a fan of Super Troopers, I despised Club Dread, and unfortunately what you get more of in this film are jokes and gags similar to those in Club Dread. Often there were scenes that were completely random so that the director could try and squeeze another joke in, however, when the joke was told all that was received from the audience was complete silence. The jokes were just painful to listen to and often I would hear a line from one of the actors and literally have to ask my friend sitting next to me "Was that a joke or what?" and in return all I would get is a confused stare and shrug. I am not able to type more negative things about this movie because frankly my mind shutdown at the 45 minute mark and I've been trying to erase the few things I do remember about this movie from my memory.

There was one saving grace, and perhaps it's the midwest redneck in me trying to break out, the concept of the American rebel or cowboy, or simply the car lover in me, but I did actually enjoy a few of the driving scenes. The music in the film was chosen rather brilliantly, as most of it is good, down-south shit-kickin' dixie anthems perfect for speeding down a dirt road winding through a forest with rocks and dust spewing everywhere behind your '69 Charger. Something about the pure southern wildboy aspect of it tugged at some small part of me I never new I had, but I guess it's similar to the feeling I get while watching a worthwhile film like Vanishing Point or Bullitt. In the end when I left the theater, even after all the nonexistant humor and despicable dialogue, I did feel like hopping in a solid, American muscle car, blasting some Allman Brothers or Lynyrd Skynyrd, and celebrating all things redneck by speeding all over.

Luckily for me, this show was not a part of my childhood and therefor no memories or nostalgia to destroy. From what I have seen or heard about the show, I expect many, many people to be upset that this piece of trash is even associated with the original series. This summer is the summer of Hollywood cashing in on remakes and sequels, and this is a perfect example of what happens when people that don't care at all about making a good movie create a movie solely for capitalizing on a name. Hopefully, after this, Broken Lizard's movie making days will finally be over.