The Dukes of Hazzard: The Beginning is a prequel to the 2005 theatrical-release film The Dukes of Hazzard. An edited version of the film debuted on the ABC Family cable television channel on March 4, 2007. 'R'-rated and unrated versions were released on DVD March 13.
Plot
Bo Duke (Jonathan Bennett) is arrested for destructive driving in neighboring Chickasaw County. Luke Duke (Randy Wayne) is arrested for blowing up illegal fireworks. Both of the teenage boys are paroled to the care of their Uncle Jesse (Willie Nelson) in Hazzard County, sentenced to a summer of hard work on the farm.
Jesse is carrying on the family tradition of producing the best moonshine in the county. Bo and Luke quickly tire of farm work and take an interest in some of the local girls of Hazzard. Attempting to visit the Boar's Nest bar, they see Jesse meeting with Boss Hogg. Jesse is arranging for his regular bribe to the County Commissioner to look the other way from his illegal moonshine operation. The Duke boys inadvertently allow Hogg's prize pig to escape, and it falls off the roof and is injured. Furious, Boss Hogg demands a sizable amount of money from Jesse, due in two weeks, or he will foreclose on the farm.
Jesse believes his only recourse is his moonshine operation, but he cannot deliver enough in two weeks. Bo and Luke volunteer, and set off to find a fast car to do the job.
The boys enlist the help of their cousin Daisy Duke (April Scott), who has just turned 18 but is somewhat of a wallflower who wonders why boys don't notice her. She takes them to the high-school shop class, where they meet Cooter Davenport (Joel Moore), who gives them a fast engine. They go to the junkyard to find a suitable car, but don't like what they see. On their way home, they find some girls sunbathing next to a local pond. Bo knocks Luke in to try to impress the girls, but upon learning from Cooter that most people who jump in end up either "crippled, on life support, or brain damaged," Bo jumps in to save him. Instead Cooter drags Luke to shore and while underwater, Bo discovers an abandoned 1969 Dodge Charger and believes it would be the perfect car. They retrieve the car from the pond, add the engine and some new paint, and The General Lee is born.
The moonshine deliveries go well but before they raise enough money to pay off Hogg, the Boss declares Hazzard a dry county, and offers a $25,000 reward for anyone who uncovers an illegal moonshine operation. He will turn the Boar's Nest into an ice cream parlor.
Meanwhile Daisy applies for a job at the bar to help raise the money. Hughie, the Boar's Nest bartender, says she's not the type of girl who should work there, and refuses her but she is smitten. She undergoes a makeover to impress him, cutting her jeans into very short shorts, wearing a shirt tied to show her midriff and she lets her hair down. The bar partrons are all stunned by how good she looks and Hughie hires her immediately, and agrees to take her on a date.
Jesse then holds a large party to raise funds for the farm, but Boss Hogg and Sheriff Rosco arrest Jesse for illegal moonshine sales, and seize Jesse's assets. Daisy, Bo and Luke visit him in jail, and he tells them that Boss is as corrupt as anyone, and the best way to get Jesse off is to find evidence of this. Bo and Luke soon discover Hogg's plan. He wants to convince all the county commissioners in Georgia to ban alcohol, thus paving the way for a thriving ice cream business. More importantly, with all the ridge-runners in jail, Hogg will then be free to make a fortune selling his own illegal alcohol, turning the Boar's Nest into a speakeasy.
Boss Hogg wants the Duke family still, which produces the best moonshine in the County. When Daisy finds out Hughie is Boss Hogg's nephew and only dated her to find out about the family secrets, she is devastated.
The Dukes kidnap Boss and ride off in the General Lee with the police following in pursuit. They threaten to drive into Hogg Ravine unless he tells them his plan. He is too scared not to tell, and his confession is broadcast over the radio thanks to Daisy's manipulation of Enos at the station. The Dukes then jump the ravine anyway (their first jump), and catch Hughie delivering illegal moonshine into Hazzard. The Dukes make Boss pay them the $25,000 reward, which they use to buy back the farm.
Fed up with Hogg, the citizens demand he reverse his dry county policy and free all the people he had arrested for selling moonshine. Just as it seems the 112-year-old candidate who always runs for county commissioner will finally win, he dies, leaving Boss as the only candidate, and he is re-elected anyway. Hogg summarily pardons himself for his misdeeds.
Cast
Home media
ABC Family first aired an edited version of the film on March 4, 2007, prior to its DVD release. 'R'-rated and unrated versions were released on DVD March 13.
Deviations from earlier versions
The Beginning creates a different backstory than was created for the Duke clan and has several other differences to the original television series.
- In the show, Bo and Luke and Daisy are taken in by Uncle Jesse as children after all of their parents are killed in a tragic auto wreck (although in the Reunion! movie, Daisy says her mother died when she was born). In The Beginning, Bo and Luke's parents are alive and the boys have been sent to the farm for the summer.
- In the 2005 version, Luke is a lady's man, in "Beginning" the situation is reversed and Bo is more of a lady's man.
- The television series often suggested that Bo, Luke, Daisy, Cooter and Enos (and occasionally Cletus and Hughie) all grew up and went through school together. This movie suggests that they did not meet until slightly later.
- In the movie, Daisy, at 18, is older than both Bo who is 16, and Luke who is 17. In the show, Bo was the youngest, followed by Daisy, and then Luke.
- Daisy is a Brunette in the prequel, and a blonde in the 2005 version.
- The movie references such modern-day devices as cellular telephones that simply did not exist when the television show aired. The Duke boys mention to Hughie, who cannot get good reception in Hazzard, that they use the CB radio instead, which was the regular form of communication in the original series.
- The Beginning uses the full paint job for the General Lee, including stylized "01" numbering and the Confederate flag. In the "prequel" the flag is already on the car. In the 2005 feature, to which this film is supposedly a prequel, the flag was last-minute addition Cooter made to the car, and the "01" was not as neatly painted on.
- In the show, as told in the seventh season's 'flashback' episode "Happy Birthday General Lee", the General Lee was a former getaway car (with an all-black paint job) acquired by the Dukes after it was impounded and sold to them by the authorities. They wanted to use it to house their new racing engine. In the movie, the General Lee is discovered by Bo at the bottom of the lake, already with its orange paint job and confederate flag on the roof, and rebuilt so the Duke boys can deliver moonshine.
- While the boys are on probation on the show for delivering shine, the Dukes in the film are not under such a restriction. (The show sometimes stated that the boys were forced to make a shine run when Uncle Jesse was ill and unable to complete the run himself, and were caught, leading to their probation).
- In the show, Hughie drove a convertible white VW Bug. In the movie, he is given a convertible BMW. Both versions, however, are white and have bull horns, to match Boss Hogg's Cadillac.
- In the movie, Daisy has crush on Hughie, and his initial rejection of her, results in her makeover. In the show, Hughie has a crush on Daisy, but she is not interested in him.
- Uncle Jesse is depicted as older than Boss Hogg, when in the show they were contemporaries.
- Rosco is described as married in the movie, and his wife has kicked him out. He was a lifelong bachelor on the show (although was subjected to a sham marriage in one episode, the third season's "Mrs. Rosco P. Coltrane").
- Boss Hogg's wife Lulu is in the film portrayed as sex mad, and makes several advances on Luke. In the series, although she was often angered by his crooked schemes, she was loyal and loving to Boss. Also, like Boss, she is not the over-weight glutton of the television series. This may be a reference to the original movie, "Moonrunners," where the wife of the "Boss" character (Jake) was having an affair with one of the boys.
Production
The film was produced under Warner Bros.' Warner Premiere label with a budget of $5 million.
Reception
Reviews were generally not positive but Kevin Carr a critic at Kevin Carr at 7M Pictures gave the film 3 and 1/2 (out of 5 stars), that despite his low expectations the film "actually fit the mold better than the first film did" and he saw it as a mix of the original series and films like American Pie.[1]
References
External links
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ABC Family Original Movies |
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| The Family Channel: 1996-1998 |
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| Fox Family: 1998-2003 |
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| ABC Family: 2003-2005 |
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| ABC Family: 2006-2008 |
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| ABC Family: 2009 |
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