Adicionar um enredo no seu idiomaAfter his rig is repossessed, an aging trucker by the name of Elegant John Howard decides he and his truck have one more good run in them, and with the help of a hitchhiker and a few others ... Ler tudoAfter his rig is repossessed, an aging trucker by the name of Elegant John Howard decides he and his truck have one more good run in them, and with the help of a hitchhiker and a few others he will make it happen.After his rig is repossessed, an aging trucker by the name of Elegant John Howard decides he and his truck have one more good run in them, and with the help of a hitchhiker and a few others he will make it happen.
- Alice
- (as Mayra Small)
- Celeste
- (as Dana House)
Avaliações em destaque
It's not a bad film, it was the kind of thing that Fonda did during that last decade, mostly films strictly for the paycheck and no strain on any ability. He's a typical red state hero, a hard working truck driver who because of a prolonged hospital stay was unable to keep up payments on his big rig and the bank repossessed it. Not something you do to Fonda who steals the truck back and goes looking for a last big load.
And what a load it is. A favorite place of Fonda's a cat house that caters to men of the road has been shut down and Eileen Brennan and her girls have been told to cease and desist. But she's got a new location in South Carolina so she moves bag and all the baggage with Fonda from Wyoming.
The film has a few laughs but some serious flaws as well. Try as I might I could not understand why the eyes of a nation should be focused on Fonda and his plight. Nor could I understand why he could not get a legitimate load for his vehicle even if it was stolen in the eyes of the law. Why should those shipping if he's got a good reputation care? And the villain of the piece drugstore cowboy truck driver Gary Sandy was hostile to Fonda for reasons that were never made clear. And Robert England's character of a hitchhiker Fonda picks up along the way is never really any kind of coherent.
I did enjoy sheriff Dub Taylor and how the women got around him after he jails Fonda and them. And the women do have a good way for paying for gas, food and lodging.
Young Susan Sarandon had a bit role as one of Eileen Brennan's girls. The Great Smokey Roadblock while not great was better than a lot of what Fonda was in during his last decade.
John Howard (Fonda) is a sick man, as he's been diagnosed with cancer. However, instead of getting treatment, he leaves the hospital in order to 'steal' his 18 wheeler, as when he got sick the bank repossessed it. Now with his truck, he's out to make one final run. Along the way, he picks up a religious drifter (Robert Englund...definitely playing against type) and a group of prostitutes...and he's out to get them to Kansas City or get caught by the police trying.
This is a VERY meandering film and the plot is strange, as it's hard to tell whether they wanted it to be a lighter story or a compelling one about death. According to IMDB, some post-production tinkering de-emphasized the death and dying aspect of the tale to try to improve the marketability of the movie...and to capitalize on the success of films like "Smokey and the Bandit" (hence the name change for this film).
So is it any good? Well, it has a strike against it because it promotes the 'hooker with a heart of gold' cliche. The realities for such women sure are different than in this movie! And as for the story, it's sad to see Fonda in it as he's fine playing the old, dying man but the goofy avoiding the police aspect of the story didn't work so well with him in the lead.
"The Great Smokey Roadblock" (1977) was originally titled "The Last of the Cowboys" and was presumably changed to take advantage of the success of "Smokey and the Bandit." While this one focuses on a trucker and a band of prostitutes, it's just as entertaining as that more popular road farce and maybe a smidgen more.
The movie repeatedly points out that Fonda's character is 60 years old, but he was actually 71 during filming and looked it. Don't get me wrong, he looked good for his age and had his usual charisma, but he didn't look 60, unless he had lived a very hard life.
Curvy Daina House is the highlight on the feminine front, but I strangely found grumpy Alice (Mews Small) notable too. Susan Sarandon is also on hand before she made it big. Actually the entire female cast is entertaining because they're fleshed out as individuals.
The geography is disingenuous as Northern California is passed off for places like Missouri, the Smokey Mountains and the Carolina coast. Yet even big budget movies back then did this, let alone small flicks like this one.
The film runs 1 hour, 44 minutes, and was shot in Oroville, California.
GRADE: B-
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- CuriosidadesFollowing a screening of The Last of the Cowboys at the Cannes Film Festival in May 1977, none of the major studios made an offer to acquire the film from production company Mar Vista Productions; they considered its storyline of a truck driver dying of cancer so depressing that it would be difficult to market. Independent production and distribution company Dimension Pictures agreed to distribute the film after Mar Vista ceded its creative rights. Against star Henry Fonda's wishes, Dimension re-edited the picture to tell a lighthearted story of a sick truck driver who makes a cross-country trip with prostitutes and then retitled it The Great Smokey Roadblock to capitalize on the popularity of Smokey and the Bandit.
- Erros de gravaçãoThere are no visible mountains from the beaches of South Carolina. The beach scene was obviously filmed on the West Coast.
- Citações
Harley Davidson: I've heard of a temple on wheels. I've seen a swimming pool in the back of a end of a truck. I've seen trucks with jock straps made o' red silk. But I ain't never seen a mobile cathouse!
- ConexõesReferenced in Basket Case - O Mistério do Cesto (1982)
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