Rolling Thunder (1977)

Directed by John Flynn. Starring William Devane, Linda Haynes, Lawrason Driscoll, Tommy Lee Jones, Dabney Coleman, Lisa Blake Richards, James Best, Luke Askew, James Victor, Jordan Gerler, Cassie Yates. [R]

After seven years as a POW, Vietnam veteran Devane returns home a hollow, damaged man struggling to readjust to civilian life. But the war is not yet over for him when he embarks on a mission of vengeance after he’s mutilated during a home invasion and his family is killed before his eyes. Paul Schrader’s script is fashioned out of many of his common themes—isolation, damnation, self-destruction, violence, etc.—but delivered as macho, brute-force vigilante entertainment that echoes of Walter Hill or John Milius (Schrader even claimed he wrote the screenplay with the latter in mind to direct). Director Flynn, however, brings a clipped style without tension, so instead of ratcheting things up for the violent climax, the audience is left to simply wait for the inevitable while soaking in the bleak atmosphere and parsing out choice moments from Devane’s restrained pain. Inspired the name of Quentin Tarantino’s short-lived distributing company, Rolling Thunder Pictures.

68/100