The Dukes of Hazzard

November 14, 2007

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t recall the Duke Boys getting chased around Hazzard County with shotguns after one of them got caught pants down with a teenage girl. Was that a part of the original TV show that I missed? My memory’s kind of fuzzy…was Boss Hogg after them for a statutory rape conviction?

Memory or not, this abortion of a movie is a looooong way from the original. Truth be told, it took me several viewing sessions to finish this movie. Really, the only thing that kept me coming back was a lingering hope that I would get to see Johnny Knoxville shirtless…and did I get that? Fuck no…he was pantsless at one point, but he has skinny white chicken legs…yuck.

I don’t blame Jay Chandrasekhar – he only had so much to work with. This was his shot at making a big Hollywood movie – what was he supposed to do, pass it up? He was given a shit script and non-actors to work with – what the fuck did you expect him to do? At least I’m beginning to hear whispers about Super Troopers 2…there’s no shame in returning to the characters that made you famous. It’s worked out well for Kevin Smith and Robert Rodriquez, hasn’t it? Actually, the only part of the whole movie that was funny was the Super Troopers Campus Security scene. “Do you know how fast you were going?” Maybe they should have worked “meow’ into the script.

The casting was absolutely HORRIBLE. It’s no surprise to anyone that Jessica Simpson can’t act, but who knew she would be THAT bad? They should have gotten Jessica Biel or even Jessica Alba. Willie Nelson was wasted – I mean that in both sense of the word. Roscoe was cast all wrong – M.C. Gainey just didn’t have that weasily quality that James Best perfected. Burt Reynolds wasn’t a good pick either – what’s the point of having a Boss Hogg that isn’t a hog? No food jokes! Actually, the only GOOD casting in the whole film was David Koechner as Cooter. He actually brought something to the role and made Cooter more realistic.

This movie will forever be known as the movie that broke up the marriage of Newlyweds Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey. Johnny Knoxville (and according to some websites, several of his Jackass co-stars) was widely reported to the culprit. Every piece of gossip that I read about the affair between Simpson and Knoxville referred to anal action of some kind, most often salad tossing. What’s funny is that most of the items I read inferred that the affair wasn’t the reason for the divorce, it was the fact that she was demanding that Nick start tossing her salad at home, too….ahhhh, celebrities.