Overrated

Best movie ever!

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

The best thing about the movie is the opening scene. The most enjoyable part is watching John Goodman in his first movie. Those two things take a total of about two minutes. There really is no other reason to watch, though it did have some potential. Alert viewers might also spot the not yet ready for prime time J.T. Walsh and Dann Florek.

John Schneider is Eddie Macon, a young man imprisoned for a crime he did not commit. He escapes from the slams, arranges for his beautiful wife and lovely kiddie to meet him on the border bridge in Laredo, kidnaps the governor's daughter, Lee Purcell, in her Mercedes, and races across Texas with Kirk Douglas hot on his tail.The musical score has a theme song, a kind of cowboy rock, with lyrics like, "Put your head on my shoulder, we can talk about things before." The music gets a jazzed-up treatment during the requisite car chase through the cemetery. It slows down and we get to hear a mournful harmonica during the scenes in which Schneider and Purcell get to know one another and Schneider talks about how much he misses his wife.The couple spend the night in the La Posada Motel in Laredo. By this time, Schneider is both filthy and exhausted from the flight. Lee Purcell coaxes him into taking a shower. She follows him in and gives him a loving wash and a kind of massage. Later she puts some moves on him but he, having just woke up, says he remembers nothing of the night before and he refuses to do anything untoward with her now because -- "You're wife," says Purcell, capping his apology.Well, the fact is that Schneider may be a good-looking guy. At least he looks, sounds, and acts like a typical Hollywood actor with an even sun tan and carefully styled hair. But he's a complete moron for brushing off Lee Purcell because she's a fox. On top of that, his three years in stir may have taught him a lot, as he claims, but they never taught him how to act. I don't think he utters a believable line in the entire movie and there are moments when a viewer might understandably wonder if he's wandered by mistake into a high school play in East Windsor Township.Purcell, however, does a professional job and so does Kirk Douglas as the savvy cop in pursuit. The dialog isn't a total loss but I'm confused about the direction and about the intended audience. It's a modern Western that smacks of the drive-in theater, but it's both cruel and indulgent to the Texans we meet on the screen. I'll give an example. Douglas is relaxing at a bar for a moment and this dumb-looking bar tender tells him a joke about blacks. It's truly offensive -- yet it's funny too. Douglas replies, "That's very funny," with no expression on his face. The audience will presumably snicker at the joke before feeling a twinge of guilt. The encounter has no function in the plot. It's simply slipped in for a laugh from the cowboys in the theater. This is known as having your cake and eating it too.As I say, the dialog as a whole isn't insulting. The writers did okay, given the plot that was demanded of them. But there is no invention in the movie. Not even in the title. "Eddie Macon's Run"? Well, there had been a successful "Logan's Run" some years before, and "The Last Run" more recently. Then there was "Macon County Line" and "Return to Macon County," the second being an indication that the first had made money, and not to mention Macon, Georgia. The failure of the film to get Texas down on celluloid wouldn't be so noticeable if there hadn't already been some that had done so successfully. Try Sam Pekinpah's "The Getaway." Or, if you want still more stylized but empathic realism, try the more recent, "No Country For Old Men." That last, a superb study of the Southwest and its citizenry, was written and directed by the Coen brothers, two nice young Jewish kids from Minnesota.

I remember reading the book on which this film is based a long time ago – before the film was made, that's for sure. Ever since I discovered it had been made into a film I've wanted to watch it, but it seems to be one of those films that is only rarely shown on the box. Now that I have, while I'm not exactly disappointed with what I saw, it's fair to say that so much more could have been made of the source material by a more accomplished writer than journeyman Jeff Kanew. I remember the tone of the book being quite dark, almost noirish, but none of that comes across in the film. For the most part, it has the look of a TV movie and some producer made a monumental mistake when he decided to allow John Schneider to sing his own syrupy songs on the soundtrack. But then, it has to be said that the music matches perfectly those early sickly scenes of domestic bliss between Macon (Schneider), his wife (Leah Ayres) and son Bobby (Matthew Meece).Pretty soon, it's Bobby, not the scenes, that becomes sickly, which is where Eddie's plight begins. It's where Schneider's plight begins too because, every time the script asks him to emote, his TV credentials come right to the fore. The fact that the script is downright awful doesn't help either.Macon's run takes him across a deep south populated by stereotypical rednecks, stereotypical small-town cops, stereotypical floozies, stereotypical bar-room drunks (including an impossibly young J. T. Walsh) and a stereotypical tart with a heart. Despite this, the film manages to remain entertaining, and motors along when it's focusing on the darker aspects of the tale rather than trying to pull at your heartstrings. Hot on Macon's heels is grizzly cop Marzack (Kirk Douglas). Douglas is too old for the part, and his judgment when it came to choosing roles was all shot to hell by the 80s, but he still shows Schneider up in their few scenes together.For all the hardships Macon is forced to endure, you know there will be a happy ending. It turns out that Marzack, like Lee Purcell's tart-with-a-heart, simply envies Macon his picture-perfect family, something he managed to keep well-hidden from us all for all but the last five minutes of the film

I saw this movie when it was released. Its a very good movie (I thought) and, the acting was better then your avg. "B" type Movies. Kurt Douglass while showing his years here, plays the street wise detective hot on the trail and his acting is still top notch. I found the story line original and creative which added to the suspense. I gave it high marks because the events in which Eddie finds himself in trouble could happen to any of us.When Eddie discovers that his job is taking a 25% cut for letting him work there he leaves in a huff. Mad, he drives off at a high rate of speed only to be pulled over by the small town cops that seem to enjoy busting Eddies chops. Already upset, Eddie finds himself in a scrap with the cops who bring him in. Now facing the local town judge, he's given a ridiculous jail term for his infraction. Eddie decides he's got to figure a way out of jail. He comes up with a clever way of not only pulling it off but, he's planned out details of his escape route as well