Movie Review: The Cannonball Run (1981)

The Cannonball Run features a star-studded cast in a racing comedy that reminds me a lot of It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World or Rat Race. The race is from Connecticut to California, and features teams of two, all with their own unique quirk.

Our leads are Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise as pretty normal people who think they’ll be fastest by disguising themselves as ambulance drivers.

In sort of a nod, I think, to Smokey and the Bandit, they also kidnap a young attractive woman (Farrah Fawcett), and they also bring along a crazy doctor (Jack Elam) to help sell their disguise.

Dean Martin and Sammy Davis, Jr. play two gambling drinkers who disguise themselves as priests and drive a Ferrari.

Adrienne Barbeau and Tara Buckman play two attractive women in catsuits who use their sexuality to get themselves out of tickets whenever they get pulled over.

And my favourite is probably Roger Moore, who plays a wealthy heir to a girdle company fortune, but likes to pretend that he is in fact Roger Moore. He of course drives an Aston Martin, is accompanied by James Bond-inspired score, and has a bunch of gadgets in his car, while also being accompanied by a new woman in seemingly every scene.

It’s a really fun sendup of the Roger Moore era Bond movies, actually. And it’s that much better as he was the current Bond at the time.

There are other characters, of course, and none of them are this enjoyable. There’s a really insensitive portrayal of an Arab sheikh, played by Jamie Farr. And there’s a team of two Asian (I think they’re supposed to be Japanese) drivers, including one played by a young Jackie Chan.

I like to think that they really didn’t know who the hell Jackie Chan was when they cast him, and when they were shooting the fight scene later in the movie, they realized the talent that Jackie Chan is, so they just kind of let him go off. I mean, the fight scene is essentially over, and still Jackie’s kicking ass.

It’s an incredibly silly movie, but one not without its highlights. It is good for a few laughs, some of them quite big, and the vehicle stunts are always nice, even if some of them (particularly early, before the race) are pretty uninspired.

I enjoyed it, but its flaws are numerous.

Rating: 6/10