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It follows Crazy Mama with another return to Arkansas, this time it's the laconic man of action who tucks his specs into his shirt pocket before a rumble. (The Grapes of Wrath is a key citation, and there's Peter Fonda in dad's shadow shielding the family home from bulldozers.) The hero is an easygoing fellow, death to him simply means "you're not here anymore." The threat to the community is a land-developer (Philip Carey) strip-mining for coal, the holdout is "nothin' but an old horse ranch" owned by the protagonist's father (John Doucette). The tipping point is the murder of the brother (Scott Glenn) and his pregnant wife (Kathleen Miller), seen friskily romping mid-afternoon as hired thugs break in, a long shot from outside of their house tilts subtly to indicate the atrocity. "Am I gonna have to start kickin' asses and takin' names?" Walking Tall cash-in, Seventies political thriller, prickly romance with the local belle (Lynn Lowry) interrupted by the revenge plot, all done with pockets of empathy and offhand effulgence by Jonathan Demme. "A free country" to the corporate rotter translates to "everything is for sale," the eco-warrior's elemental progression passes from fiery sabotage to bow and arrow. Rapid dissolves paint the landscape gripped by business machinery, the solitary honest politician ("a real health nut") is assassinated in a scene revised by Demme in his remake of The Manchurian Candidate. Human observation enriches genre mayhem, the burning of the ranch is preceded by the stubborn geezer showing his late wife's mementos to his grandson, "oh, she would have loved you." The nocturnal-blue raid on the tycoon's headquarters goes into The Silence of the Lambs, as well as Soderbergh's The Limey. With Harry Northup, Noble Willingham, Ted Markland, and Gino Franco.
--- Fernando F. Croce |