In the Deep South, because where else, Tom Eldridge (Mark Miller, Blonde in Bondage) runs a moonshine business on his 7.5-acre property … until the town sheriff (Christopher George, Mortuary) shows up to throw a wrench in the works. As Tom panics and tries to flee Johnny Law, he’s shot dead by a lummox of a deputy (Wes Bishop, who wrote and produced the film).
Daddy’s death is the first domino in a string of troubles in motion for Tom’s two daughters, Dixie (Jane Anne Johnstone) and Patsy (Kathy McHaley). They face eviction from their home, thanks to the local greedy banker (R.G. Armstrong, Evilspeak), and can’t find a job — cue the montage of the ladies walking past multiple “NO HELP WANTED” signs. When close family pal Mack (Warren Oates, Stripes) fails to win the $1,000 grand prize at The Moto-Cross Big Race — seriously, that’s what it’s called — the Eldridge girls decide to resort to the ol’ standby. No, not prostitution: revenge.
A knee-jerk reaction would be amazement that Dixie Dynamite works as well as it does. But Bishop and frequent director Lee Frost made B-movie magic almost every time at bat in their long and fruitful partnership, which included horrors that shocked (Race with the Devil), schlocked (The Thing with Two Heads) and stripped (House on Bare Mountain). This proto-Dukes of Hazzard entry into the hicksploitation contender is no different. In fact, it’s one of the better ones, comfortably forming a wheel-centric companion to Chrome and Hot Leather, Frost/Bishop’s 1971 biker pic.
Plus, with Oates as something of a third-lead ringer, Frost/Bishop were able to anchor the film with more talent than the duo’s lesser efforts. If Dixie Dynamite holds any sort of surprise, well, it actually has two. The first is that one of the racing cyclists is Hollywood legend Steve McQueen; don’t bother looking for him, because he’s hiding uncredited underneath a helmet. The other, larger surprise is not that Johnstone and McHaley had zero movie credits before this, but that they had zero afterward, as both women are radiant. The screen clearly adores them, making their vanishing act from it all the more criminal. And speaking of, the final reel’s heist sequence cleverly pulls a Quick Change/Inside Man trick years before either had the chance. —Rod Lott