Smokey and the Bandit
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Smokey and the Bandit is a 1977 movie starring Burt Reynolds, Sally Field, Jackie Gleason, Jerry Reed, Pat McCormick, Paul Williams, and Mike Henry. It is considered by many to be "the truck drivers movie" and would inspire several other trucking films including two sequels, Smokey and the Bandit II (originally known as Smokey and the Bandit Ride Again in the U.K.), and Smokey and the Bandit Part 3. Also, a television movie was loosely based on the film called Bandit. The three movies introduced two generations of the Pontiac Trans Am (unlike the television movie version, in which the other Bandit drives the Dodge Stealth R/T Twin Turbo). The film was the second highest grossing film of 1977, beaten only by Star Wars.
Most of the movie centers on Bo "Bandit" Darville (Reynolds) and his partner Cledus "Snowman" Snow (Reed), with his Basset Hound named Fred, taking a shipment of Coors beer from Texarkana, Texas to Atlanta, Georgia. ("Bandit" and "Snowman" are the two men's CB radio handles). At the time Coors wasn't available in the eastern US; it was illegal to ship it east of Texas. In fact, Texarkana, Texas lies in Bowie County, Texas, which is a dry county. Texarkana, Arkansas is "wet", but Coors could not be shipped east of Texas. There was no Coors in Texarkana; the closest Coors would have been found in the small Cass County, Texas community of Domino. Coors being illegal, it was necessary for the Snowman to drive the semi full of beer, while the Bandit drove the "decoy" car, designed to take the attention of the police away from the truck and its illegal cargo. The term "Smokey" refers to the state troopers, whose hats are similar to those worn by park rangers and thus the character of Smokey the Bear -- state troopers also being known as "Bears", as in the rebellious truck-themed song Convoy.
The trucking duo were promised $80,000 (roughly $250,000 in 2006 dollars) from Big and Little Enos Burdett (Pat McCormick and Paul Williams, the character names being a not-very-sly way of assuming some facts about their respective genitals) if they could make the run in 28 hours. Along the way, Bandit picks up Carrie (Field), whom he nicknames "Frog" because "you're always hopping around," because she's "cute, like a frog," and he'd "like to jump [her]," and finds himself being pursued by Sheriff Buford T. Justice (Gleason). Carrie had run away from her wedding to Justice's son, Junior (Henry), and so the plot gets going when Buford is told Frog got into a Trans-Am.
The movie then depicts a high-speed chase, with Justice's police car steadily falling to pieces as he and a cast of many police in several states attempts to chase down and arrest Bandit and Snowman and retrieve his prospective daughter-in-law. Bandit and Snowman are greatly assisted by a number of colourful characters met along the way, many of whom they contact through their CB radios.
Television censorship
When Smokey and the Bandit first aired on American network television in the early 1980s, censors were faced with the challenge of toning down the raw language of the original film. For this purpose, they overdubbed dialogue deemed offensive, which was (and remains) common practice. Unfortunately, the original actors were unavailable, therefore substitutes were used. In the case of Jackie Gleason's character, a voice actor with a noticeably higher voice was used and in some scenes in both this film and the TV version of Part II, a considerable amount of Gleason's dialogue was re-recorded by this uncredited actor. The most noted change made for network broadcast was the replacing of Buford's often-spoken phrase "sumbitch" (a contraction of "son-of-a-bitch"; usually in reference to the Bandit) with the nonsense phrase "scum bum". This phrase achieved a level of popularity with children. The TV prints of the first two Bandit films are still shown regularly on television, although a few TV stations aired the unedited version in recent years as some of the phraseology became more acceptable on TV.It is believed the uncredited voice actor is Henry Corden, who is best known for doing the voice of Fred Flintstone in the 1970s and 1980s.
At one point in the film, Sheriff Justice tells his son, "There's no way... no way that you could have come from my loins. When we get back home, the first thing I'm gonna do is punch your mama in the mouth!" In other words, somebody that dumb couldn't be his son, therefore his wife was cheating on him. In the TV version, the line is changed to "...from my genes." But while the sexual reference was changed, the censors chose to leave the Sheriff's confession of intent to commit spousal abuse in the movie, whereas the expression "from one's loins" is an old-fashioned folk expression that would hardly seem to merit censorship.
Pop Culture references
In 1998, rock star Kid Rock loosely emulated the movie in the music video of his second single Cowboy. He is followed by some of his band in a tractor trailer and he picks up a bride from a casino, whom is married to a sheriff. His route ends on the Hollywood Blvd.[#endnote_kidrockcowboy]
In 2000 the RnB singer Nelly released an album called Country Grammar. The video of the seventh song on the album, "Ride Wit Me", features Nelly playing the part of Bandit. It featured trucks filled with beautiful women and Nelly picking up a bride off the side of the road in a Pontiac Trans Am.[#endnote_nellyridewitme]
In 2005, on the auto TV show Automaniac, Bill Goldberg is treated to a ride in the original Trans Am by Burt Reynolds at Irwindale Speedway. Burt comments on the show that the Trans Am was the "most important lady in the film."
In 2005 the Family Guy film, "Family Guy Presents: Stewie Griffin - The Untold Story", the Smokey and the Bandit theme music played at one point as the motorhome began to drive across the US. This was done as a typically Family Guy-esque pop culture reference
In the 2006 series of My Name Is Earl, Earl gives his brother a ride in the Smokey And The Bandit car to cheer him up after they were unable to attend a fair at which the car was on display. Earl star Jason Lee is a known Burt Reynolds fan.
Popular TV series That '70s show has made many references to Smokey and the Bandit in their first and second season.
Trivia
This movie and its two sequels came out the same years Star Wars and its first two sequels came out (1977, 1980, 1983).References
External links
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