I first discovered The Georgia Peaches by accident on YouTube and after learning about, I decided to check it out. I absolutely loved it and it was a blast to watch being a Trans Am enthusiast, a Smokey and the Bandit and Dukes of Hazzard fan. I heard many negative things about this movie, more particularly from "Dukes" fans who claim it was a knock off of the series.
This movie while does share some of the elements of Bandit and Dukes, it didn't feel like a knock off at all and did more of its own thing IMO. One thing that did strike me was that this movie seemed to be based off of a Dukes episode that aired months before this movie titled "Mason Dixon Girls" which had two girls and their male friend out whit bad guys, which the Dukes help out in.
In the episode, they are seen driving a silver 1979 Trans Am convertible with blue decals. Georgia Peaches has a very similar format that has two girls and their male accomplice, who drives a silver Trans Am, but is an 1980 model with the 301 turbo and has red interior with the silver/red decals. Both programs were aired on CBS which makes it the more interesting.
Given the task to produce this film was Roger Corman and his studio, who mainly produce low-budget, yet very thrilling car action films with credits such as Cannonball (1976), Eat My Dust (1976), and Grand Theft Auto (1977). You can tell that they did not have a lot of money to work with this movie, but they did the very best they could and utilized it very well with great car chases,
good stunt work and some car crashes, and a good cast. Dirk Benedict was great and makes for a really great good ole boy character driving the Trans Am around and out-pacing the cops. Being a Trans Am enthusiast myself, the car was outstanding and the filmmakers added a unique feature to the car that not even the Dukes boys in the General Lee never thought of using to
stop bad guys or the cops. The Trans Am here has a firing mechanism referred to as the claw that can tear out the rear axles of enemy vehicles and destroying evidence of moonshine. Tanya Tucker was great and does a good job acting considering she isn't a professional actress. Everybody was also great and gave their best in this film.
If you are a fan of Smokey and the Bandit, Dukes of Hazzard, or car chase films, I highly recommend this movie. For a low budget movie Georgia Peaches/Follow that Car was a blast to watch and its a very underrated gem of the 70's and 80's car chase genre. 8/10.