POLK COUNTY POT PLANE (1977) is a dreamy Wednesday night

Posted by Daniel Metz

As Lars Nilsen, host and curator of Weird Wednesday, likes to say during some of the rougher films in his series, there are very few perfect bad movies. I remember the first time I heard him say this, about a miserable mummy movie titled Voodoo Black Exorcist back in August ‘08 (I’m dating my time in Austin by that comment, I’m afraid), and from that first time I understood exactly what he meant; bad filmmaking can be funny, it can be accidentally transcendent, but more often than not it is simply boring and incomprehensible.

Polk County Pot Plane, thankfully, is not as imperfect as Voodoo Black Exorcist. In fact, it is generally quite fun and ridiculous. According to Lars’ introduction, the film is based on a true-life event in which a plane full of drugs came down in Georgia in the early 1970s. The cast is made entirely of real cops and real drug dealers. That’s a nice touch.

I couldn't find any images from the film, but this picture is like a realistic version of the film

The leads in the film, played by (brothers?) Don and Bobby Watson, are named Oosh and Boosh respectively. Every time someone mentioned their names in the film, the audience let out a chuckle. Yes, it is that kind of a movie.

During Weird Wednesdays, I often am pressed to find something to take a note about during the screening. This time, however, I took a tiny pen and jotted this note: I love this particular brand of inept filmmaking that leaves out as much exposition as it overindulges in others…What I mean by this statement is that things happen which are unexplained, and other things are drawn out ad nauseam. That creates a surreal experience which is especially wonderful at midnight. In this respect, recent WW titles Teen Lust and Convention Girls fit the same editing style.

This came up in google search...she may have been in the film, who knows?

Basically, it’s a fun little film full of bad acting, bad dialogue, and stupid people doing really stupid things. Also plenty of car chases/crashes. The production history, which Lars outlined a bit in his introduction, makes the film much more interesting. Maybe you can get him to tell it to you some time.