Steven Spielberg's first theatrical film was another road film, although a very different one from Duel. For this film he tells the unique tale of a large and unique pursuit through the state of Texas.
Lou Jean (played by Goldie Hawn) is a young mother distraught that her young son Langston has been taken away from her by the state. She has developed a plan to break the boy's father, Clovis (played by William Atherton) out of Minimum Security prison and the two of them are going get their son back from the foster home he was taken to in Sugarland, Texas. She is able to get him out of prison with minimal difficulty, but their plan hits a bump when their first ride breaks down and they are forced to take a State Trooper, Officer Slide (played by Michael Sacks), hostage with the intent of him driving them both to Sugarland. Hot on their tail is Police Captain Tanner (played by Ben Johnson), a lawman who takes pride in not having killed anyone in his 18 year long career and isn't looking to start now. Instead, he keeps in pursuit of the young couple and Officer Slide to try and resolve the situation. However, as the pursuit continues to draw out, so does the number of people following them, leading to a parade of squad cars behind them. Things only escalate further when the press get a hold of the story and in the process turn Lou Jean and Clovis into folk heroes of sorts.
Steven Spielberg handles the material of this film quite well, no doubt taking lessons learned with Duel and applying them to this film. He also had the ability to get some impressive shots within the main car with Hawn, Atherton and Sacks through the use of the newly invented Panaflex camera, a compact camera that they were able to easily maneuver throughout the interior of the car. There's an impressive bit when Captain Tanner first pulls up to the car on the driver side, then pulls behind them and then over to the passenger side that is pulled off seamlessly all in one shot in one single 360 degree shot. This was the first film Spielberg made with cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond, a director of photography he would go on to collaborate with many more times and the two manage to craft a visually splendid movie from beginning to end.
The film also marks the first collaboration between Spielberg and John Williams. The two would go on to work together on almost every film he made except for The Color Purple, Bridge of Spies, and Ready Player One. For this film, Spielberg originally wanted a full orchestral score for the film, but Williams talked him into a more stripped down score of mostly a solo harmonica and some strings, which is similar to some of the score Williams did the previous year for the musical Tom Sawyer that he collaborated on with the Sherman Brothers. It works really well for the film though and fits in well with not just the story but also the shots of the Texas landscape the film is set in.
The acting in the film is great. The biggest star of the film would be Goldie Hawn and this film really gave her a chance to stretch a bit as an actress as she took on a role with a bit more dramatic weight to it and she rose to the challenge wonderfully. She turns in a great performance as the determined Lou Jean, who is determined to reunite her family no matter what, even as it becomes increasingly clear that things are not going to work out. William Atherton is just as good as Clovis, who is willing to do anything to help his wife. It's a performance that came about before Atherton got typecast as the smarmy antagonist thanks to turns in the likes of Ghostbusters, Real Genius, and Die Hard. He plays off Hawn really well as the more practical and grounded of the couple. Ben Johnson plays Police Captain Tanner well and gives the character a good deal of humanity that makes it easy to understand where he's coming from. He wants to resolve the situation as peacefully as possible, but the more it drags out, the more and more clear it becomes that it most likely will not. Michael Sacks was great as Officer Slide, who gives his character a levelheadedness to know his captors don't really mean him any harm. Because of this, the three of them begin to bond over the course of that long chase to Sugarland.
If the movie has one fault it's that we don't get to know the characters as well as we would like. We get to know Clovis and Lou Jean and Slide at least to a degree, but I would've loved more time spent with them than with the countless shots of parades of police cars, a subplot of two Louisiana Troopers in new cruisers driving over to Texas to join in the fun and all the little off-shoots like that. Still, as a first theatrical feature, it's a damn good theatrical debut with some colorful characters and an early showing that Spielberg could handle heavier material.
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