michaeljhuman
You sort of have to like these Hal Needham/Reynolds movies to like this.The plot is weak. The dialog is mildly amusing. I found the whole chicken sponsor thing pretty funny though.Loni Anderson fans might enjoy her ridiculous role as the naive PR person for the chicken chainThere's cleavage shown from time to time which some will appreciateI have read the book, and the movie is quite different than the book. The book is a series of stories, possibly tall tales, loosely based on the experiences of the writers in racing. It's mostly about sex, heavy drinking and wrecking/racing cars. I enjoyed it a lot. The book is better than the movie IMOI think Nabors and Reynolds have some funny interactions.Auto racing is rather limited, probably due to cost. But you do get to see some vintage cars and racing footageJust remember this is a silly pointless movie, in the spirit of movies like Smokey and the Bandit and maybe you will enjoy it like I do
Phil Hubbs
In the middle of the 'Cannonball Run' franchise (between 1 and 2), after 'Hooper', and towards the end of the 'Smokey and the Bandit' franchise (before the third), Needham and Reynolds teamed up again with this effort. Easily the weirdest movie title I've come across for some time, it sounds like a porn flick, funny thing is its actually the main characters name. So the fact this is a Hal Needham movie, you can guess its gonna be about fast cars. Yep, fast cars, Burt Reynolds, some blonde eye candy and crashes, business as usual. This time Reynolds is actually a genuine race car driver on the NASCAR circuit...instead of the regular dashing cowboy. But this being a Reynolds character, this race car driver is of course arrogant, flashy and carefree of virtually everything around him, your basic narcissistic Reynolds character. Sounds good huh, well let me ice your balls down a tad. So Ace loses his sponsor by generally being an assh*le, so he has to find another. Along comes Torkel (Ned Beatty) who runs a fast food chicken franchise offering Ace a deal, did I forget to mention Torkel's director of marketing and public relations is the blonde bombshell Loni Anderson? Well that pretty much explains why Ace accepts the deal without reading sh*t. He then spends the entire movie (along with his mechanic Jim Nabors) trying to get out of this bad deal which sees him opening fast food joints and dressing up in a chicken suit.Yes that is in fact the whole plot in a nutshell, and yes you're right, it is extremely thin on the ground. This really does come across as a lame attempt to squeeze another fast car flick out of Reynolds by either Needham or Warner Bros. I mean seriously, the aim of the movie is for Ace and co the try and get fired by Torkel, so they don't have to do the stupid things they agreed to do by the contract. At times this does include some racing which is filmed at the famous locations of...Charlotte Motor Speedway, Talladega Speedway and Atlanta Motor Speedway. Now this might sound impressive but it isn't really as much of what we see is stock footage (clearly), and the sequences filmed for the movie are obviously done so in front of sets and small crowds.The racing segments are too damn obvious, clearly racing at a slow speed and clearly not in any real danger of anything despite what the plot wants you to think. Sure Reynolds does appear to be behind the wheel of a real moving car as we've seen in his other car flicks, but there is zero tension or thrills here, nothing to engage you at all. To top that you don't really see much racing either, a few minutes of car footage, some refueling, some wheel spins, some cars grouping bumper to bumper (at slow speeds), that's it. Its then a quick cut to the finish where Reynolds generally wins if he hasn't been beaten by his incredibly clichéd young, good looking, blonde, male rival. Every racing flick protagonist has to have an arch rival antagonist who's usually blonde and younger, or the same age.When Ace isn't racing he's doing these promotions for Torkel's chicken franchise. Obviously these things aren't suppose to be genuinely funny or of high quality, they are suppose to be hokey and embarrassing for Ace, but its embarrassing to watch! There is literately nothing remotely interesting to see in these scenes, its not funny, its not clever, Loni Anderson in skimpy attire doesn't make it any better (well...) and Jim Nabors ISN'T funny dagnabbit!! At the same time Beatty as Torkel is a quite disgustingly stereotypical southern hick type who really made me not want to visit the American south. His chauffeur is played by Bubba Smith...but I don't know why because he does nothing accept lift a car up when a jack breaks. That's the sole reason why they cast the guy, for that one visual strength gag, good grief!Yeah so spoiler alert (who cares!), in the end they manage to trick their way out of Torkel's dastardly contract, with the help of Feeny (Anderson) who of course falls for Ace during the run time. Did anyone really NOT see Loni Anderson's character failing to fall for Reynolds slimy charms? You know what's gonna happen in this movie from watching the first five minutes, and no I can't overlook that. Thing is, what Ace and co do to break the contract, isn't that deception and kinda illegal? pretty sure you can't pretend to be a big company and pretend to offer to buy someone out.Yeah so if you like Needham's rollicking stunt flicks then look elsewhere, there is none of that here. This is a weak entry and offers no excitement at all from either the racing or the characters. The only plus points I can think of, that some folks might like here, is the historic car porn on display and the casting of various famous NASCAR drivers (none of whom I have any clue about).3.5/10
Jonathon Dabell
It occurs to me that some of the films that have been banned during the course of cinema history were actually very important and very good films. I'd like to argue that instead of banning challenging, controversial movies the censors should consider banning films that are so bad that they pose a threat to your IQ and your sanity. If they were to do so one of the first films to be quickly hidden away would undoubtedly be "Stroker Ace". This film is awful with a capital 'A'. It is the worst film Burt Reynolds ever starred in.... quite a feat for for a man with "Cannonball Run II", "Cop And A Half" and "Rent-A-Cop" on his CV!The wafer-thin story introduces us to successful stock car racer Stroker Ace (Reynolds), a man who loves fast cars and fast women. He gets stuck in a demeaning contract with crooked promoter Clyde Torkle (Ned Beatty). The contract requires him to do some humiliating promotional work for a new chain of fast food restaurants, such as dressing up as a giant chicken. Thrown into the mix are Lugs (Jim Nabors), Ace's dim-witted pal, and Pembrook Feeney (Loni Anderson), a bimbo with a brain fractionally smaller than a pea who is wooed by Ace.Hal Needham, the director of this low-grade garbage, was formerly a stuntman and he made numerous films that relied on his expertise in staging spectacular stunts and car chases/races. Some of these films were OK, like "Hooper" and "Stunts Unlimited", but with "Stroker Ace" he reaches a career nadir. The characters are so stupid that you actually feel pity for the actors playing them. Anderson especially is saddled with such a dumb role that it makes you grind your teeth with despair. The humour is weak and infantile throughout, and the stunts and race sequences are unremarkable. Even the out-takes during the closing credits (which can be found in all the Reynolds-Needham collaborations) are generally unfunny, which gives the impression that maybe the film wasn't much fun to make. "Stroker Ace" is a stinker of considerable magnitude.
