# Sugarland Express, The (1974)

### reviewed by
Long Che Chan

The Sugarland Express directed by Steven Spielberg starring Goldie Hawn, William Atherton, Michael Sacks rated PG for violence and language

The Sugarland Express is part of a genre of film that includes Thelma and Louise and Dog Day Afternoon- the road-movie-cheer-for-the-celebrity-criminals type of film. I would imagine it would be hard to make this type of movie: first you have to create characters charismatic enough for you to cheer for them, then you have to find capable and charismatic actors to play the part, then you have to please the audience with great, fun, mischievous doings (performed by these characters), then you have to please the critics with some "hidden" morality tale, some inkling of life that can be found by analyze-to-the-core critics. It's a lot to juggle. The Sugarland Express, Steven Spielberg's debut theatrical release, pulls it off, probably not as successfully as Thelma or Dog Day, but in the end, we're fanatically rooting for the criminal duo and hoping they get what they seek.

The movie is based on a true Texas occurrence in 1969 and has an at times saucy and at times dim-witted heroine, Lou Jean (Goldie Hawn), who visits her husband, the quiet Clovis (William Atherton) at the prison farm from where he is soon to be released. Lou Jean is a woman with a lot of nerve. Their baby son has been taken away by the authorities- the couple are petty thieves- and she asks, actually, she commands her husband to break out of this almost pleasant prison to help her get their Baby Langston back. Clovis is in a state of perpetual fright of his wife- what she says goes. So, to get his son back and to please Lou Jean, Clovis goes with her and gets a ride with an elderly couple who have just visited their son at the prison. When the elderly man is pulled over for driving dangerously slow, Lou Jean takes control and drives away with his car at high speed, summoning the attention of throngs of police cars. The movie becomes a car chase and after Lou Jean crashes the car, she kidnaps a highway-patrol officer, Slide (Michael Sacks), and the chase resumes.

The screen is bombarded with automobiles- trailers, cars, trucks. Like in Spielberg's previous assignment Duel, a made-for-TV movie, the cars play a significant role - they are the setting. I don't think there is one scene after the chase begins where streams of cars aren't present on the screen. They shine in the bright sun, are crashing together, and zooming fast on the crowded, cluttered roads. Most of the time, Lou Jean and Clovis are in Slide's police car. He is, strangely, helping them- touched by their persistence, perhaps.

Like Thelma and Louise, which is essentially a road movie, The Sugarland Express is a red-orange experience. Vilmos Zsigmond, the director of photography, photographs sunsets and the cars shimmering in the sunlight. The film has a certain summer heat that comes off the screen and builds the excitement as Lou Jean and Clovis make their way to Sugarland, the town where Langston is living with adoptive parents.

An element seen in Dog Day Afternoon is seen here- Lou Jean and Clovis, two criminals, are glorified and made celebrities by the public. Just like they did for Sonny in Dog Day, the crowds form and rally and applaud this couple who plan to get their kid back. The crowds bring gifts, flags, money. They surround the police cars until they almost make a lake of people, until they make the cars into boats crossing this sea of humanity. Lou Jean welcomes this popularity and fame with open arms. She loves it. She loves the presents, she loves the recognition, she loves the attention. The two men in the front seats roll their eyes as she receives the gifts and listens to all the admiring and supportive talk from strangers.

All the while, police cars are following the couple into the horizon. The Sugarland Express is full of twisting excitement and pleasure, the pleasure that I felt lacked in the dry husk of a movie sensation known as Jaws. The editing is a bit uneven, making the first half of the movie at times dry and too quick or too slow, but that diminishes in the light of the almost satiric comedy in which the movie lives. The Sugarland Express doesn't even have a morality tale, really, and the critics ate it up, as did I.

    By Andrew Chan

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