Bootleggers

Bootleggers was filmed just across the 'holler' from me many years ago. It was a funny film with some pretty good acting and yes, some pretty lousey acting but still funny. Slim Pickens was perfect for the role of Grandpa Pruitt,and I'd love to see him making moonshine again.

I saw this in the theatre when I was 13 and I loved it! Plus it was when the actor Paul Koslo was in a groove - I saw him in The Omega Man, Mr. Majestyk and then Bootleggers - all around the same time. So I was very aware of him and he's terrific in this as is Slim Pickens and a very young Jacklyn Smith! Good regional filmmaking.

Paul Koslo and Dennis Fimple star in Bootleggers as cousins who are following the Pruitt family business of making mooonshine. As family patriarch Slim Pickens says, the soil where they live is so rocky and thin it won't grow decent crops so what is there left to do?

It would be a good life other than the fact the Pruitts have a blood feud going with another Arkansas hill family the Woodalls who are also business rivals.

Shot in Arkansas Bootleggers is set during the Roaring 20s and has a nice bit of authenticity to it. Dennis Fimple sees Al Capone as some kind of role model and when you come down to it, their feud with the Woodalls is no different than Capone's with Bugs Moran.

Jaclyn Smith is 'introduced' here and she sure looks different than she would be on Charlie's Angels. You can hardly believe this hillbilly girl is Kelly Garrett and who sold a line of beauty products.

Bootleggers never got a New York or Hollywood premiere. But I'm sure it did brisk red state business.

Can't really remember much about this movie, except that it was shown in the very early days of HBO, over and over. I remember HBO being a huge novelty (movies on TV! without commercials!) but the novelty soon faded as they had a pretty limited set of titles to show. Bootleggers seems to have been one of them; I feel like they showed it several times a week at least. Anyway, I watched it, and enjoyed it, back then when I was 13 or 14. Would love to see it again and find how it compares to my memory.

Period piece film, 1921. You'll recognize slim pickens as grandpa. Competing families trying to earn a living bootlegging moonshine during prohibition, the federal law from 1919 to 1933. Various states had their own versions in addition. The two families get into showdowns now and then, hatfield and mccoy style. Lots of harmonica and banjo music. Every now and then we hear cartoon music, keeping it light and fluffy. And silly. One of the keywords is "hixploitation"....that's pretty accurate! Jaclyn smith ( charlie's angels) is in here, teasing one of the moonshiners. Moves pretty slowly, and the film is badly in need of restoration. But i'd be surprised if that happens. Picture is pretty dark, bad in some spots. The sound is just fine. Just moves soooo slowly. Big violent showdown at the end, as expected. Directed by charles pierce. He also wrote sudden impact, a dirty harry story. Pierce played homer in the bootleggers, and got his whole family in on the act. It's okay.