Cross-Country Circus

By RICHARD SCHICKEL

THE SUGARLAND EXPRESS Directed by STEVEN SPIELBERG Screenplay by HAL BARWOOD and MATTHEW ROBBINS

The Sugarland Express is a simple story of a mother's love and the lengths to which a woman possessed by it will go to recover her child when an unfeeling society forces them apart.

It sounds familiar enough--like the plot of an old Bette Davis movie cap-sulized in a late-show listing. But Mom in this case is played by gum-snapping Goldie Hawn, and there is nothing classy about the way she expresses her grief or the methods she is willing to employ to pry Baby Langston out of the foster home in which he has been placed.

Discharged from prison, Lou Jean Poplin--sometime beautician, full-time nudzh--must first spring her husband Clovis (William Atherton) from the minimum-security prison where he is serving a short term for sundry low crimes and misdemeanors, then help him snatch a car to transport them to

Sugarland, the small Texas town where little Langston does not appear to be missing them at all.

The first car they grab is stopped for breaking the speed laws--too slow. The next belongs to the officer who made the collar--an earnest highway patrolman named Slide (Michael Sacks), whose lectures on police procedures, vehicular maintenance and the prevention of marital discord make him first a hostage, then an accomplice. Captain Tanner (Ben Johnson), the cop who organizes the comical pursuit of the miscreants, must ride herd on his trigger-happy associates. He must also keep the inevitable crowds of reporters and television crewmen from turning events into a media circus. In neither endeavor is he entirely successful.

The humor of the chase comes from Tanner's success in converting it into a stately progress. The 20 or 30 police cars involved generally serve as escort vehicles rather than the weapons of vengeance. The suspense stems from the fact that everyone but the criminals knows that Tanner must in the end uphold the kidnaping law rather than the spirit of common humanity, which has led him into his protective strategy.

The picture ends in tragedy, but one which is more muted than it might have been without the efforts of Slide and Tanner. It also winds up as a small but authentic surprise gift for audiences. Miss Hawn's performance is rather too obviously calculated, but her male co-stars--Atherton, Sacks and Johnson--are adroit throwaway artists. The script neatly balances action, suspense and soft-spoken humor. Best of all, 26-year-old Director Steven Spielberg, in his first feature after a promising start in TV, emerges as a man to watch. It is easy to patronize and satirize simple, down-homish material, even easier to sentimentalize it. Sugarland does neither. It goes straight down the middle of the road toward some modestly stated human truths.

Richard Schickel

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