The Cannonball Run | | Cast : | Burt Reynolds, Roger Moore, Farrah Fawcett | | Director : | Hal Needham | | Studio : | Warner Home Video | | Format : | Color | | Released Date : | June 19, 1981 | | DVD Released Date : | June 05, 2001 | | Language : | English (Dubbed), French (Subtitled), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), Spanish (Dubbed), English (Original Language) | | Audience Rating : | PG (Parental Guidance Suggested) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | July 02, 2005 | | Summary | Yes its Widescreen | Content
 | It says 16x9 format on the dvd package and it is in its theatrical widescreen format. Widescreen lovers enjoy. |
| Rating | | | Date | June 14, 2005 | | Summary | Wiseguy commentary more than usual commentaries | Content
| The director qand producer are both giving out the commentary and at times they deliberately joke off (specially the producer) for example the producer claims a little boy seen in one shot is actually him as a kid! The producer was in fact over 30 years old when he made this film! I found the commentating duo referring to Jackie Chan as pretty a little fairy fine. Maybe they were trying to be way too politically correct about human racial races (not car races). The commentators laugh a lot too. As for the film itself. It is not that dated and everybody performs well (though Reynolds is not as involved here as in Smoky and The Bandit he does good all the same).Farrah Fawcett is undeniably one of the most beautiful and interesting females the world over as she shows here. Excellent outtakes too in the closing credits too. |
| Rating | | | Date | March 19, 2005 | | Summary | You'll Have A Ball | Content
| During the 70's and up through the mid 80's, Burt Reynolds was the biggest box office star in the U.S. Considering how most of his film work is dismissed by most now, Deliverance notwithstanding, that was quite a feat. Truth be told, while I will aggree that most of his straght action roles were a bit overdone and the romatic comedy Best Friends missed the mark, the man did have two films that are classics. The first Smokey And The Bandit and the original Connonball Run may be mindless drivel to some, but for me they are a heck of a lot of leave your brain at the door fun.
In Cannonball Run's case, it's a film that owes quite a bit of its style to Stanley Krammer's It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World from 1963. A cross-country car race provides the plot for this action madcap comedy with an all-star cast. Each of the racers have their own motives for wanting the huge cash prize that awaits at the finish line. Reynolds, joined by Jackie Chan, (before he hit it big here in the U.S.) Roger Moore (spoofing Bond of course, Farrah Fawcett (post Angels), Rat Packers Dean Martin & Sammy Davis Jr. (as holy men), fmous country star Mel Tillis and future Fox Sports football "analyst" and former Steeler Terry Bradshaw among others for some fun. Director Hal Needham (who did Smokey as well) lets it all hang out. The best laughs come from Dom DeLuise though as a would be superhero. Writer Brock Yates's script doesn't really care about making too much sense and that's probly a good thing.
I was kind of hoping for more extras on the DVD...The audio commentary features Needham and producer Al Ruddy's recolections to be sure and that's fine. But I wanted to see a few deleted scences and maybe a retrospective. Instead, the only other bonus material is a few static cast & crew bios.
Cannonball Run is a mindless throwback that's silly and fun. |
| Rating | | | Date | March 02, 2005 | | Summary | A blast from the past | Content
| This is one of those wacky 70's movies with an all-star cast that became almost a staple of the time. With Burt Reynolds, Dom Deluise, Sammy Davis, Jr., Dean Martin, and Jack Elam in the starring roles, it served up some very funny comedy that I was surprised to find still holds up today. There are so many stars from previous years and decades in the movie that it's almost like they're getting together for one last silver screen reunion before retiring to rest on their laurels. The fact that the movie is one big farce and they probably didn't take it that seriously, either, probably helped, since it looks like everyone is having an uproariously good time while doing it. Some of the antics date the movie a bit, but still, it's all in good fun, and apparently the movie is based on real races that were popular at the time, although highly illegal.
I was pleased to see Elam get considerable screen time here. He was a real trooper who served tirelessly in supporting roles all his life and was always a class act even when he was a disreptuable bad guy (which he was most of the time). I remember Jack Elam most from the opening scene at the train station in Once Upon a Time in the West, but here he gets probably his funniest role as a wayward proctologist who's always brandishing his middle finger, causing the other actors to back away in fear, which was always good for a laugh. In the Once Upon a Time scene, I read that they smeared watermellon juice on his face to get the flies buzzing around his head to do that scene. His famous wall-eyed visage only made the doctor role funnier. Deluise, "the fat man who make everyone feel good," also gets one of his funniest parts. All in all, still a fun movie sporting many of the most famous shining lights of previous Hollywood decades. |
| Rating | | | Date | November 07, 2004 | | Summary | What it would look like if Ed Wood made a car chase movie | Content
| It would be one thing if Cannonball Run was just a crappy movie made by actors who seem to forget they are on camera but this movie inflicts the greatest sin in that it has a complete lack of respect for it viewers. From phony car chase scenes where the action is sped up and quick turns are made over the top of 50 pre-existing sets of black rubber on the highway to the ridiculous improv mugging of Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise who seem to think that because they make each other laugh that they are actually funny this movie seems to say "You are stupid enough to have paid to see this crapball that we are going to refuse to put any effort into entertaining you." If your idea of humor is DeLuise morphing into a fat superhero cleverly referred to as Captain Chaos, or Him and characters who not only drive drunk but actually flaunt their cocktails/beer when pulled over by police then you will pee your pants with glee when watching this movie. It's difficult to determine who phones in the worst acting performance in Cannonball Run: Farrah Fawcett who seems to be under the influence of bus fumes throughout; Burt Reynolds whose lack of self-awareness is almost frightening; Dom DeLuise who apparently didn't realize the camera was rolling in his scenes; Dean Martin/Sammy Davis Jr. who pass off their drunken rat pack stage antics as acting or Adrienne Barbeau who flashes her prodigious bosoms to every cracker state trooper in the country. It's difficult to decide what element of crapness is the most frustrating: The fact that no matter where in the country the action is supposed to be taking place it looks like Barstow; the car chase that conveniently supplies a ramp to jump the train (which conveniently has a long row of flatbed cars just as the truck approaches the ramp) or the seemingly endless number of scenes where one of the "racers" has been pulled over by the (usually dimwitted and incompetent) local authorities. Like "Plan 9 From Outer Space", Cannonball Run has that slapped together in 4 days of shooting feel. As though Hal Needham was oblivious to what was happening and just shouting "Print it." My favorite example is the scene where Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise land a plane in a small town's downtown area. Barricades and crowds just happen to already exist as the plane lands. When the plane takes off check out the left side of the shot as a cameraman is obviously apparent standing on a stairway. To sum up, this movie really irks me with its complete lack of regard to everything moviemaking stands for. And writer Brock Yates has tried to divorce himself from this movie claiming that it was taken in a different direction than he has intended. C'mon Brock, the scenes where you appear at the beginning of the race would seem to indicate you were "acting" of your own accord (no pun intended.) So spare yourself the time of buying this stinkbomb and just flush a $10 bill down the toilet instead. |
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