The movie is such a confident mixture of comedy and drama, and so assured and disciplined, it's amazing to realize it's Spielberg's first directorial effort (although he had done several television shows prior, including the terrific minimalist horror movie, Duel).
shareAmen to that. This got a strong 8/10 from me.
shareGoldie Hawn should have gotten an Oscar for this.
shareI admired it as well, but every single person I have recommended it to has come back saying they didn't like it. I think the bummer ending puts people off. It leaves them with sour, or perhaps unresolved, feelings.
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the movie sucks...its so unbelievable. Which country can't catch 2 harmless people?
oh if they did, we wudn't get a 2 hr movie.
Clearly you don't know the history of this true story. And since when are armed kidnappers considered 'harmless?' One need only look to the slow chase of O.J. Simpson to understand that this film revealed the odd way that the public will often react to those they sympathize with when criminals become celebrities and hints at the cult of celebrity that surrounds those who don't necessarily warrant any admiration (see Paris Hilton). And just for your information, it's true that the actual evens only took a few hours from start to finish but the entire escapade was certainly long enough to to warrant a 2 hr movie.
shareI doubt they would have shot the cop if he had walked away.
Poorly Lived and Poorly Died, Poorly Buried and No One Criedshare
every single person I have recommended it to has come back saying they didn't like it. I think the bummer ending puts people off. It leaves them with sour, or perhaps unresolved, feelings
Terribly underrated by IMDb voters.
I gave it an 8/10.
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Decent movie - entertaining, but far from great...To me to call this a 8 or 9 really sets the bar low.
6 / 10
6/10 and I'm sane, thank you.
shareWatched this again recently for the first time in years and I was absolutely blown away. I can think of very few movies as sensationally directed as this. Spielberg was just overflowing with talent and with visual ideas here. The movie is an incredible pleasure to look at. But also the acting is really wonderful - Atherton, Hawn, Sacks, and Johnson are all really great, very natural. Plus Spielberg did a fantastic job of recruiting local non-actors to give the film a great reality (and comic flavor).
Perhaps Pauline Kael's finest moment was her review of Sugarland Express. She wrote that Spielberg "could be that rarity among directors — a born entertainer — perhaps a new generation’s Howard Hawks. In terms of the pleasure that technical assurance gives an audience, this film is one of the most phenomenal debut films in the history of movies. If there is such a thing as a movie sense . . . Spielberg really has it."
One of my favorite movies of the 70s. The "Sassafrass tea" scene is unforgettable.
"The tastes and weaknesses of an artist but [] no actual creative inspiration." -- Fitzgerald