Smokey & the Bandit (the first one) = Must watch for newbies

Great casting.

 

It's hard to imagine anyone who would drive a truck not having seen this movie. But I'm an old white guy I guess.

Man, Sally Field had it goin' on back then.

 

I won’t say it’s the only reason I got in to trucking, but it pointed me that direction.

 

The first time I saw it was in a theater in Bellingham Washington in 1977.

 

It wasn’t out long when I saw it the first time. When the VCR came out many years later I may have visited Blockbuster a time or two and left with it. The last half dozen or so years of my career I would occasionally need to watch it to get some of my love for trucking back. It did help me make it to my finish line.

 

There were a couple reasons I went into trucking, and SatB was one of them. There was also "Cannonball", "Movin' On", "Convoy song"( the original, see below, I had to sing the 1st verse for my chauffeurs license ), "They drive by night", "BJ and the Bear"( except for that stupid monkey), to a lesser extent, Maximum OD, Big trouble little China, Duel, but it was without question, SatB was the biggie. In fact, I had a friend, my 1st OTR experience, he had a W900 just like Snowmans. It was tough to find one, as everybody wanted to be Snowman. I read, Gleason was custom made for the roles in 1&2, but was leery with #3 because he was getting old and didn't want Buford T Justice to be his last legacy.
This video( circa 1974) is getting tough to find, look at all the cabovers,, this video brings a tear to my eyes, and realize the blooper, it's a FL, not a Pete with a reefer on.

 

As a 57 year old gen x I can safely say that the two biggest influences on my generation were Eddie Van Halen and Smokey and the Bandit.

 

hey bandit, nice ###

 

The greatest opening scenes and song to a trucking flick.