User Reviews

Spielberg has constructed and shot his first feature film with skill. The camera seems to be exactly where it should be in every shot. The editing is done with skill, and Vilmos Zsigmond's photography vividly evokes a bare and wintry day in southern Texas. The musical score is a kind of whimsical folksy harmonica solo smacking of a Christmas carol. It was written by John Williams, he of the bum bum bum bum shark theme from "Jaws". His scores are usually orchestrated, fully and fulsomely, but you'd never know it from this spare tune.

The director got a fine screenplay out of Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins. Most of these good folks sound dumber than they are. And the performers really get into the characters. Sometimes they ARE the characters.

Here's an example that always cracks me up. Ben Johnson is a captain in the Texas Highway Patrol (or whatever) and has brought Goldie Hawn's wrinkled old father down to talk to his daughter over the police radio, urging her to surrender. Johnson has just given the old timer instructions on how to use the microphone in the police car. Hawn's father listens intently. Then we expect him to say something like, "Gimme the mike." Instead, in his cracked and weathered voice, he repeats Johnson's instructions word by word: "Press -- this -- button -- and speak -- in a NORMAL tone of voice." It's as if he's trying to memorize all of the instructions for getting the most out of Windows 8. And Johnson plays the scene straight and convincingly, showing a total respect for the man, being sure to call him "Sir", probably as Johnson would in real life. The father is played by George Hagy, who never made another appearance on any screen and who was probably picked out on the spot from the crowd of extras.

The story is simple. Goldie Hawn talks her prisoner husband, William Atherton, into escaping from pre-release, planning to kidnap their baby and flee to Mexico. The police soon catch on and the pair take a highway patrol officer, Michael Sacks, hostage and ride off to the baby's home in Sugar Land, followed by a string of police cars a mile long.

There are numerous comic incidents, and a few scenes involving gun shots and action. I hope the stunt men were paid well for the scene in which the news van flips over into a puddle. In some ways, the movie follows a trajectory illustrated by "Bonny and Clyde." As the scenes of action progress, they get more serious until they turn tragic. The couple are also lauded and helped by the ordinary folks of the towns they drive through. Spielberg has kept an eye on the size and response of the audience.

It's not an art film. Hawn's and Atherton's first escape vehicle is an old clunker that steams and bangs at its full speed of twenty miles an hour, but when the escapees spin around to elude the police, the sound of the engine changes from a loud knock-knock-knock to that of a Formula V Maserati. And, for my taste, too much time is given to cute Baby Langston, a habit Spielberg has rarely been able to shake. In ninety percent of respectable movies, all children should be stomped. Their appearances tend to cheapen the film, except in W. C. Fields' movies.

Goldie Hawn is sexy and delivers a fine performance as the mercurial screecher with the IQ of a head of broccoli. Whose breath blew out the light within this brain? Atherton, with his vacant face, is okay as the submissive husband. Once in a while, a pale beam of reality shines through his antics, but generally his character prompts one to ask whose was the hand that slanted back this brow? As the police officer who is their hostage, Michael Sacks is earnest and although he gets to like his captors and play games with them, he at least is in touch with the outer world. Ben Johnson is simple but reliable, and I miss the guy.

Normally when you put Spielberg, John Williams, and a great cast together, you get a super mega hit adventure. This one does not fit that mold because it is based on a true story with some Hollywood embellishments. While it is well directed, it is not on a par with this famous directors later films.

The are 2 major assets in this movie. Goldie Hawn is great, as she plays the role of the mother who wants he child back perfectly. She is obsessed and yet a little cracked. There might not be as much of Goldies skin in this one compared to some films, but there are several sequences which do use her figure to great advantage.

The 2nd major asset is Ben Johnson. His role as the major lawman in pursuit of the escaped boyfriend and his wife in pursuit of their child who was placed with foster parents is very well done. While this is not everyones best, just Goldie and Johnson make this one worth watching.

Haven't heard about "Sugarland Express" till recently and I had to see it because it was vintage Spielberg, and I'm a fan. And I wanted to see the young Goldie Hawn. I was not disappointed. It was one of these road-chase movies, bigger than life, but it was unique, especially because it was based on a true story. That fact made me incredulous throughout the film, but everything in Texas is supposed to be bigger than life.

Goldie desperately wants to get her baby back. She was in jail for some minor crimes and was found to be an unfit mother and her baby was put in a foster home and the foster parents were going to adopt him. Despite being a young girl, or maybe because of it, she was desperate to have her baby back. It was a love-child and the mother-love was passionate and obsessive. Hawn played the part to the hilt and used her sexuality and femininity to overcome the objections of her husband who was in a pre-release facility with low security.

She had a plan to help him escape, but he didn't want to risk it, take a chance of being caught and being incarcerated again. He only had four more months to serve. The other inmates were incredulous as they disguised themselves and got an old couple to give them a ride.

From this quiet beginning the film proceeded to repeated crescendos of drama and excitement. Try to imagine the young couple, young officer in tow, leading a chase of police cars, first a few, then a few dozen, then many dozen and ultimately hundreds, law-enforcement officers from all over the state and then snipers and a helicopter.

Lucky for the young couple an old-hand cop realized they were just a couple of kids and he staved off snipers with telescopic long-range rifles and a couple of vigilante gun-nuts.

You know something bad is going to happen at the end, because these kids didn't know what they were doing; they were madly in love and in a fantasy-land of getting their little boy back and living happily ever after in Mexico. Something bad happened, but something good happened. It will be worth your while to see this little classic from one of the greatest directors of the 20th century.

This well-acted chase movie was a box office flop when it was first released and is now most significant for being the first feature film that Steven Spielberg directed. Its story, which Spielberg also co-wrote with Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins, features enough car chases and stunts to illustrate that his ability to choreograph action sequences was already well developed at this early stage of his career, as was his skill at creating shots that are beautifully composed and visually impressive.

Based on a real-life incident that took place in 1969, "The Sugarland Express" is an account of what happened when a young married couple, who had both spent time in prison, decided to embark on a long trip across Texas with the intention of kidnapping their child from its new foster parents.

Having recently been released from a prison sentence she'd served for shoplifting, Lou Jean Poplin (Goldie Hawn) visits her husband Clovis (William Atherton) at the minimum security prison where he has only four months of his one-year sentence to serve and insists that he should break out immediately (with her assistance) so that they can head to Sugarland, Texas to take back possession of their son who the welfare people had fostered out to a middle-aged couple. Clovis initially resists the plan but gradually gives in to Lou Jean's forcefulness and they simply walk out of the establishment together before travelling away from the place, courtesy of an elderly couple who travel along the highway at about half the speed limit before getting pulled over by a highway patrolman.

When Patrolman Maxwell Slide (Michael Sacks) talks to the elderly couple outside of their vehicle, Lou Jean becomes convinced that he's actually pursuing them and so the young couple drive off at high speed and are soon followed by Slide. The chase ends when Lou Jean crashes the car she's driving and the couple then surprise the patrolman by taking him hostage and hijacking his vehicle. From this point on, the two fugitives and Slide continue their long journey to Sugarland during which they're pursued by an ever-growing number of police and media vehicles that follow them at a very slow speed. Police Captain Harlin Tanner (Ben Johnson) is put in charge of the whole operation and becomes determined to avoid any harm coming to Patrolman Slide or the misguided couple who he regards as being simply foolish and naïve rather than dangerous criminals.

During their journey, an unlikely friendship develops between Slide and his captors and they're also met by crowds of well-wishers as they pass through various towns on their route. Lou Jean, who always acts on instinct without ever thinking about the repercussions of her actions, clearly has no idea of how much trouble they're in and foolishly expects that when she and Clovis are re-united with their baby, that they'll all be able to live together, as a family, and be happy ever after. The fact that the media attention has made them into celebrities and they get lots of public support only reinforces her delusional thinking and strengthens her determination even further. All the chaos and activity that characterised their journey suddenly ands' however, when they get to Sugarland and the police convoy comes to a halt some distance before they reach their baby's current home.

This movie is brightened up by its action sequences, some moments of droll humour and an amusing example of Stockholm syndrome but otherwise its pace is too slow, and there is none of the exhilaration that would normally be found in a road movie or the excitement that a chase movie would usually provide. This is because the fugitives are only out of sight of the authorities for the first few miles of their journey and the remainder of the pursuit is played out in slow motion with the police even staying back at a respectful distance when the fugitives have to stop to refuel their vehicle.

Goldie Hawn is brilliant as the loud and not-very-bright, Lou Jean and William Atherton is marvellous as her obedient husband who's prepared to do anything she wants even though he doesn't share her belief that everything will turn out fine. The remaining members of the cast also provide consistently solid performances with Ben Johnson and Michael Sacks standing out in their important roles.