A Small Town in Texas

These cool seventies movies, courtesy of Mr Arkoff, set a cool trend in the movie world for me. If you expect a lot of gore in this, you'll be plenty disappointed. What we have is a fatal love triangle. I like any Bottoms actor, they're all good. Timothy my favourite, makes a meal of the role, throwing in a naturalistic and lovable performance, as an ex con, Poke Jackson, framed, who's just got out of prison, now about to rub the same guy up the wrong way, small town local sheriff, the corrupt Duke (Hopkins in another nasty piece of work). Duke has been makin' it with Bottom's old lady, Mary Lee (the versatile Susan George) who you kind of get the feeling, she's wasted in this. Duke is about to give Poke a second serving of misjustice by setting him up again for a murder of important figure at a country fair, and this time properly doing the job. So the other half has Bottoms fleeing the cops, which culminates in a couple of cool car and bike chases, and god, can Bottoms ride. Bottoms is funny too: Helium voice scene, and we take guilty delight seeing both nemesis go at each other, where in the end, only one can walk away. Great action, and revenge that never gets old, plus sincere performances, make this a gem of a seventies movie, though it's not great, but definitely a golden 70's find.

This obscure (to me anyway) film has a lot of problems. All the characters are either one dimensional, annoying, or cliched. It's overlong, boring, and has a script that spends the first half meandering around endlessly, then gets hopelessly predictable.

In its defence I will say that it is less dated than many films from the 1970s, and is occasionally entertaining or amusing (mainly me laughing at the dolts who populate this film). And its handful of action scenes are decent...though I suspect they may seem better than they really are because even the most inept stunts would seem exciting compared to the generally mundane tone of the film.

You could do worse, but you could do much better too.

A Small Town In Texas is a film that I put high on the list of genre action films that were a staple at drive-in's during the '1970's and '80's. The car action is great with real stunts. A great cast of film supporting actors and the always cool directing of the late Jack Starrett. Bo Hopkins is great as the sheriff, Morgan Woodward as the corrupt rich local, John Karlen and Clay Tanner as deputies, Susan George as the girlfriend is '70's hot!,Art Hindle is always good and Buck Flower steals the show as a cussin', spittin', tough-as-nails hick who helps Timothy Bottoms against the crooked law man. I hope a DVD release will be in the near future.

Even within its own and secluded subgenre (that genre being the good ol' boy hixploitation), "A Small Town in Texas" is a largely unremarkable and utmost derivative effort. The film has all the mandatory ingredients, like corrupt sheriffs, bluegrass music and virulent car chases, but the plot is overly simplistic, and the three lead characters are weak and unmemorable. Timothy Bottoms has zero charisma as the ex-con on the run for the corrupt Sheriff who wants to frame him for murder. The Sheriff, as played by Bo Hopkins, is alright, but not nearly as grim and menacing as the rotten lawmen in other contemporary semi-classics. Susan George is a lovely woman and a more than decent actress, but she one major handicap for starring in this film. She's far too British to depict a Texan local gal and can't really hide her accent. The makers must have noticed this as well, since she doesn't have many significant lines. The undisputed highlight of the film is a random but outrageous appearance by George 'Buck' Flower - who else - as the sneering Uncle Bull. "A Small Town in Texas" certainly isn't a total waste of your precious time, but there are much better and equally obscure hixploitation classics out there to discover (notably "Moving Violation", "Jackson County Jail", "Poor Pretty Eddy", "....tick...tick...tick", "Nightmare in Badham County", etc")

In the 1970s there were a lot of these grade-B, drive-in type movies set in rural Southern locations. Typically, there was a sheriff, a youngish protagonist, lots of car chase action, and some kind of conflict involving the sheriff and protagonist. "A Small Town In Texas" clicks all these boxes. And so the underlying idea here isn't original.

Yet, the down-home rural atmosphere seems fairly realistic, as the movie was filmed in and around small towns near Austin. Male characters are generally good ole boys with minimal education; and the women are fairly inconspicuous. The main character is Poke (Timothy Bottoms), a local hick just out of prison who has a score to settle with Sheriff Duke (Bo Hopkins). The corn pone dialogue is about what you would expect for local yokels. There's some fairly good suspense in the second half. And part of the plot involves corruption surrounding a political event.

The script has several major problems, apart from being unoriginal. First, the inciting incident is postponed too long, so that the plot's first thirty minutes meanders. Second, the scriptwriter overuses the car chase cliché; here there are three, complete with inept cops and screeching tires. Third, the script leaves dangling the subplot involving character C.J. Crane.

Casting is less than ideal. Bo Hopkins seems to have become typecast. Timothy Bottoms looks too young to play a hardened criminal, though his performance here is acceptable. Secondary characters seem more like two-dimensional stick figures. I really like that mournful score, played at the beginning and at the end. Cinematography and production design are okay, but the film's color seems highly muted.

Life in a small, rural town in the American South, combined with some contrived drama sums up the premise of this film. "Macon County Line" is much better. But "A Small Town In Texas" is acceptable if other similar movies are unavailable.