Honky Tonk Freeway

English director John Schlesigner ("Midnight Cowboy," "Marathon Man," "Darling") cast a jaundiced but comical eye on America in the early '80s in this epic ode to capitalism and the open road ... which also turned out to be one of the era's epic financial disasters. The picture cost $24 million - big money in those days - and was yanked from theaters the week after its release in August 1982, having grossed a paltry $2 million.

Few people saw it but cable reruns have earned it a cult following as one of the period's oddball masterpieces. People either find it appalling mash-up of the work of Robert Altman (“Nashville”) and Hal Needham (“The Cannonball Run”) or love its jumble of offbeat characters. Terrific performances come from heavyweights like Jessica Tandy (who insists she's not an alcoholic but orders five Old Fashions for lunch), Hume Cronyn (her exasperated husband) and Geraldine Page (an outraged nun) on down to clowns like Beau Bridges (a loser who writes children's stories about a carnivous pony), Howard Hesseman and George Dzundza.

Edward Clinton never wrote another screenplay and Schlesinger's career suffered severely as a consequence of this big-budget flop, with only one major credit ("Falcon and the Snowman") after this film. The film is a mess but it's a glorious and frequently very funny mess - the sort of picture no studio would gamble on these days.