We're dying to see ''The Dukes of Hazzard''

We’re dying to see ”The Dukes of Hazzard”

RELEASE DATE August 5

WHY WE CAN’T WAIT Because Jessica Simpson was born to fill Daisy Duke’s short shorts. Also, because this should be more offbeat than the usual sitcom-to-screen adaptation, thanks to director/cowriter Jay Chandrasekhar (Broken Lizard’s Club Dread). And did we mention Jessica Simpson’s hot pants?

THE PREMISE Bo and Luke Duke (Johnny Knoxville, left, and Seann William Scott) are just a couple of good ol’ boys, never meanin’ no harm. Still, they get in trouble with the law, under the corrupt thumb of Boss Hogg (Burt Reynolds). They get out of it with the help of cousin Daisy (Simpson), Uncle Jesse (Willie Nelson), and a souped-up Dodge Charger.

SOURCE The 1979-85 CBS sitcom

THE BACKSTORY Chandrasekhar took the car chases seriously, hiring Dan Bradley, who coordinated those hair-raising chases in The Bourne Supremacy. ”I told Dan I want [the chases] to feel like when you got in the car with that guy in high school who was out of control,” the director says. ”You got in that car once and didn’t get in again.”

BURNING QUESTION Is the car still named for Robert E. Lee and painted to look like the Confederate Stars and Bars, or have the Duke boys gone PC?

COME FOR The hot cast of young ‘uns, who are wry and easy on the eye

STAY FOR The cool cast of elders, who are sly and spry