Friendly Fire (1979)

          Topical made-for-TV movies have gotten a bad rap over the years, and not without justification—name a hot-button social issue from the ’70s to the present, and chances are there’s a perfunctory telefilm about the topic, if not a number of them. Given this backdrop, ripped-from-the-headlines TV movies that qualify as legitimate dramas seem even more exceptional than they might otherwise. Friendly Fireis a good example. Opting for quiet character moments over outright emotional fireworks, Friendly Fire explores the circumstances and repercussions of a controversial topic quite effectively by grounding its story in the harsh realities of human pain. Based on a book by C.D.B. Bryan that detailed the experiences of a real American family, the picture concerns two Midwestern parents who cut through government red tape while investigating how their son died in Vietnam. With the help of a reporter, the couple eventually discovers their son died, accidentally, at the hands of a fellow U.S. soldier, hence the film’s title.

          Yet the heat of Friendly Fire doesn’t just come from the revelation of a battlefield tragedy. Rather, much of the picture concerns an attempted cover-up by the U.S. government and the U.S. military, two entities desperate to keep a socially acceptable “face” on the Vietnam War. As the long movie progresses (Friendly Fire runs 147 minutes), it’s impossible not to grow more and more infuriated with the stubborn bureaucracy with which the parents are confronted. Presented in an unvarnished style, with present-day scenes of the parents revolving around flashbacks to Vietnam that gradually reveal the true facts of what happened there, Friendly Fire packs a punch for several reasons, one of which is highly surprising: The star of his very heavy picture is none other than beloved TV comedienne Carol Burnett, who was still fresh from the long run of her eponymous variety show. Dispelling any humorous associations with her gravitas-laden performance, Burnett and costar Ned Beatty create an absorbing illusion with their respective portrayals of Iowa residents Peg and Gene Mullen. Exuding heartland values and the noble grief of parents who need to imbue their son’s death with meaning, the Mullens, as played by Burnett and Beatty, represent a uniquely American sort of selfless heroism—their bittersweet victory in exposing the truth is a triumph for all parents who entrust their children to America’s military.

          Director David Greene, a versatile helmer of big- and small-screen projects whose filmography includes everything from the religious musical Godspell(1973) to most episodes of the seminal miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man (1976), approaches the film’s sensitive subject matter with restraint, allowing the poignant textures of Burnett’s performance to dominate. (Beatty is wonderful, too, though his job is playing straight man to Burnett’s bravura emotionalism.) As for the other principal actors, Sam Waterston, whose character is based on C.D.B. Bryan (the author of the source material), offers fine support as the principled journalist who makes the Mullens’ cause his own, and a young Timothy Hutton appears as the Mullens’ other son, a young man wrestling with anguish and guilt while his family’s existence becomes an endless battle against a monolithic system.

Friendly Fire: GROOVY

Wise Blood (1979)

          By the end of the ’70s, veteran director John Huston had amply demonstrated his ability to change with the times, making a series of hip oddities that stood in sharp contrast to the stuffy museum pieces created by many of his chronological peers during the ‘70s. Of these offbeat pictures, Wise Blood is perhaps the strangest, not only because the underlying material is peculiar but also because Huston presents the story as if it is high comedy—even though the narrative of Wise Blood is a grim compendium of episodes featuring characters gripped by criminal, delusional, self-destructive, and sociopathic impulses. It’s clear that the intent of the picture was to offer broad satire about certain cultural extremes prevalent in America’s Deep South, but it’s difficult to laugh when characters deeply in need of psychiatric intervention court oblivion.

          Based on Flannery O’Connor’s 1962 novel of the same name, the picture follows the exploits of Hazel Motes (Brad Dourif), a Georgia native who returns home from military service in Vietnam to find that his old life has disappeared—his family skipped town, leaving their home an empty wreck. Unexpectedly adrift, Hazel relocates to the city of Macon and builds relationships with a group of eccentrics living on the fringes of society. Hazel’s new acquaintances include Enoch (Dan Shor), an exuberant young simpleton; Asa (Harry Dean Stanton), a fire-and-brimstone street preacher; and Sabbath (Amy Wright), Asa’s twitchy daughter. Eventually, Hazel decides to start his own religion, which isn’t actually a religion, so he ends up preaching against Jesus on the same street corners where Asa sings the gospels. Meanwhile, an edgy romance between Hazel and Sabbath takes shape, and Enoch follows Hazel around like a puppy. It all gets very bizarre—one of the subplots involves stealing a shrunken corpse from a museum—and the great Ned Beatty joins the story midway through as an opportunistic guitarist/preacher/swindler.

          Although Huston films the story with his customary elegance, blending evocative production design and subtle camerawork to create a vivid sense of place, the arch nature of the characterizations makes it difficult to buy into Wise Blood’s illusions. Dourif seems like a foaming-at-the-mouth lunatic in nearly every scene, rendering audience empathy nearly impossible; his performance is unquestionably committed and intense, but it’s a drag to watch. Meanwhile, Shor and Wright incarnate ignorance with painful believably. Only Beatty and Stanton strike a palatable balance between the lightheartedness of Huston’s storytelling and the ugliness of O’Connor’s story. Wise Blood would have been a unique film no matter who sat behind the camera, so it’s doubly impressive that a veteran of Huston’s caliber tackled such challenging material. Alas, novelty alone isn’t enough to make for a rewarding viewing experience.

Wise Blood: FUNKY

White Lightning (1973) & Gator (1976)

          The voiceover hype in the trailer says it all: “Burt Reynolds is Gator McCluskey—he’s a booze-runnin’, motor-gunnin’, law-breakin’, love-makin’ rebel. He hits the screen like a bolt of white lightning!” Indeed he does in White Lightning, arguably the best of Reynolds’ myriad ’70s flicks about working-class good ol’ boys mixin’ it up with John Q. Law. Whereas too many of the star’s Southern-fried action pictures devolve into silly comedy—including, to some degree, White Lightning’s sequel, Gator—the first screen appearance of Gator McCluskey is a sweaty, tough thriller pitting a formidable hero against an even more formidable villain. If you’ve got a hankering for swampy pulp, White Lightning is the gen-yoo-wine article.

          When the picture begins, Bobby “Gator” McCluskey (Reynolds) is incarcerated for running moonshine. Meanwhile, back home in the boonies, corrupt Sheriff J.C. Conners (Ned Beatty) causes the death of Gator’s little brother. Once Gator hears the news, he swears revenge and joins an FBI sting operation targeting Conners’ crew. Using a staged jailbreak for cover, Gator hooks up with a moonshiner named Roy Boone (Bo Hopkins) and penetrates Conners’ operation in order to dredge up incriminating facts. However, it’s not long before the no-good sheriff smells a rat, setting the stage for a showdown. Written by William W. Norton and directed by the versatile Joseph Sargent, White Lightning is a no-nonsense thrill ride. Even though the filmmakers cram all the requisite elements into the picture’s lean 101 minutes—including a love story between Gator and Roy’s girl, Lou (Jennifer Billingsley)—the focus remains squarely on Gator’s hunger for vengeance, which manifests in bar brawls, car chases, shootouts, and various other forms of 100-proof conflict.

          Working in the fierce mode of his performance in Deliverance(1972), Reynolds is a he-man force of nature, whether he’s punching his way through hand-to-hand combat or, in his own inimitable fashion, clutching a steering wheel and gritting his teeth while his character guides cars through amazing jumps. Reynolds’ fellow Deliveranceveteran, Ned Beatty, makes a fine foil, especially because Beatty defies expectations by underplaying his role—hidden behind thick glasses, with his portly frame bursting out of tight short-sleeve shirts, he’s a picture of heartless greed. The gut-punch score by Charles Bernstain jacks things up, as well, so White Lightning lives up to its name—it goes down smooth, then burns when it hits your system.

          Reynolds let a few years lapse before returning to the character with Gator, which also represented the actor’s directorial debut. Essentially rehashing the narrative of the fist picture, but without the emotional pull of a murdered-relative angle, Gator finds our hero released from prison, again, to take down another corrupt lawman. What Gatorlacks in originality, however, it makes up for in casting and production values. Country singer-turned-actor Jerry Reed gives great villain as smooth-talking redneck crook Bama McCall, chubby funnyman Jack Weston generates laughs as a sidekick prone to physical injury, and gap-toothed model-turned-actress Lauren Hutton lends glamour as Gator’s new love interest. (TV host and occasional actor Mike Douglas shows up in a minor role, too.) The sheer amount of property destruction in Gatoris impressive, though the movie relies too heavily on spectacle since it can’t match the tension of its predecessor.

          Oddly, the weakest link in Gator is Reynolds’ performance, because the actor veers too far into comedy. By this point sporting his signature moustache and demonstrating his gift for pratfalls and other slapstick silliness, Reynolds seems to occasionally forget he’s making a thriller. Sure, some viewers might find this take on Gator McCluskey more fun to watch than the grim characterization in White Lightning, but it’s worth nothing that Gatorhelped start Reynolds down the slippery slope into his goofy Smokey and the Bandit and Cannonball Run movies. Gator’s worth a gander, since it’s hard to complain about a movie being too enjoyable, but it’s not as satisfying as the title character’s debut.

White Lightning: GROOVY

Gator: GROOVY

Gray Lady Down (1978)

The disaster genre was already starting to repeat itself by the late ’70s, so the only real novelty of Gray Lady Down is that it puts a military spin on the underwater tension that audiences enjoyed in The Poseidon Adventure (1972). Unfortunately, the military angle removes from the equation a key element to any successful disaster picture, which is overwrought melodrama. Specifically, since the characters in Gray Lady Downare trained to work together during crises, the only real conflict has to do with minor disagreements about strategy; thus, we’re deprived the cheesy fun of watching silly characters squabble during a catastrophe. Furthermore, the almost completely male cast ensures that Gray Lady Down is a monotonous onslaught of macho posturing. Atop all that, the movie’s simply not very good in terms of narrative execution—even with a solid cast for this sort of thing and the constant presence of life-or-death jeopardy, Gray Lady Down fails to generate memorably exciting moments. Charlton Heston, in extra-serious beardy mode, plays Captain Blanchard, skipper of the U.S. Navy submarine Neptune. One foggy night, the Neptune gets rammed by a freighter, then sinks to nearly 1,500 feet and gets lodged in an underwater canyon. Hard-driving but otherwise personality-free Captain Bennett (Stacy Keach) is sent to supervise the ensuing rescue effort, but when the Neptune sinks even further, additional manpower is required. Enter Captain Gates (David Carradine), the iconoclastic pilot of a small, experimental submersible called the Snark. Simply by dint of their watchable personalities, the scenes aboard the Snark between Carradine and Ned Beatty, who plays Carradine’s sidekick, have some life. And, of course, watching Heston tromp around the bridge of the Neptunewhile he barks orders through clenched teeth is campy and fun. Alas, most of Gray Lady Down is as bland as the color cited in its title, so what should have been a simple little thriller ends up being a chore to endure.

Gray Lady Down: LAME

Dying Room Only (1973)

After the success of Duel (1971), it was inevitable that prolific fantasy/sci-fi writer Richard Matheson would pen more TV movies in the same mode, although none of these subsequent projects had Duel’s strengths of an inspired concept and a superstar-in-the-making director. Still, second-rate Matheson telefilms including Dying Room Only are highly enjoyable, simply because the man knew how to twist the screws of a suspense story. In this seedy melodrama, stressed-out spouses Bob Mitchell (Dabney Coleman) and Jean Mitchell (Cloris Leachman) pull into a roadside motel while traveling through the Southwest. The Mitchells are suitably disturbed by the locals occupying the diner adjacent to the motel, including corpulent customer Tom King (Ned Beatty) and snarling short-order cook Jim Cutler (Ross Martin), so they decide not to stay. Yet while Jean uses the restroom, Bob disappears, and the locals try to persuade her that Bob bolted. Thus begins a slow-burn nightmare in which Jean must convince a small-town sheriff (Dana Elcar) that a conspiracy is afoot. Although the storyline of Dying Room Only is predicated on the usual contrivance of ostensibly intelligent people making stupid choices (when you walk into a redneck diner and everyone glares, leaving is probably your best option), Matheson brews a tangy combination of claustrophobia and paranoia. Leachman freaks out effectively, accentuating the primal emotions inherent to Matheson’s narrative; furthermore, reliable character players Beatty, Coleman, and Elcar nail their supporting roles, while Martin is surprisingly sinister as the main villain. Familiar to TV audiences for his long run as a wisecracking sidekick on The Wild, Wild West (1965-1969), veteran actor Martin digs into darkness with gusto. Like so many TV movies of the era, Dying Room Only ends abruptly since the brief running time precludes full exploration of the story, but it’s a fun ride while it lasts. (Available at WarnerArchive.com)

Dying Room Only: FUNKY

The Last American Hero (1973)

          Based on a nonfiction story by Tom Wolfe, which was in turn based on the career of real-life NASCAR driver Junior Johnson, The Last American Hero is a solid character piece elevated by the documentary-style realism of its racing sequences and by uniformly good acting. The screenplay, by William Roberts, is a bit on the thin side, relying on broad characterizations and a hackneyed structure, but the aforementioned strengths help smooth over shortcomings in the writing.

          Jeff Bridges stars as Junior Jackson, the movie’s fictionalized version of Johnson. He’s a willful young man living in the Deep South, working in the family business of running moonshine. Junior’s skill behind the wheel comes in handy for evading cops, but because local police know all about the Jackson’s operation, Junior’s father, Elroy (Art Lund), is in and out of jail on a regular basis. When the legal bill related to one of Elroy’s arrests exceeds what the family can afford, Junior steps up deliveries but also joins demolition-derby races organized by an unscrupulous promoter (Ned Beatty).

          Soon, Junior graduates to the big time of the NASCAR circuit, where he competes with a super-confident champion (William Smith) and courts a racetrack groupie (Valerie Perrine). The story gains dimension once Junior starts running with a big-city crowd, because his aspirations to independence and integrity wither upon exposure to pressures like the need for sponsorship. In particular, Junior gets into an ongoing hassle with Burton Colt (Ed Lauter), a hard-driving entrepreneur who sets usurious terms and expects humiliating deference. All of this interesting material serves the concept encapsulated by the Jim Croce-sung theme song, “I Got a Name,” because the thrust of the story is Junior’s search for identity.

          Bridges is great, as always, winningly essaying Junior’s transition from naïveté to worldliness, and the supporting actors fit their roles perfectly. Lund and Geraldine Fitzgerald provide earthy gravitas as Junior’s parents, while a young Gary Busey adds an impetuous counterpoint as Junior’s brother. Perrine, all blowsy exuberance, captures the damaging caprice of a woman caught in fame’s tail winds, and Smith is understated as a man who realizes his moment in the spotlight is slipping away. Lauter rounds out the principal cast with his petty villainy, providing a formidable obstacle for the hero to overcome.

          Much of the credit for this ensemble’s work must go to director Lamont Johnson, whose handling of the movie’s visuals is as strong as his guidance of the actors. Though usually an unassertive journeyman, Johnson surpasses expectations by elevating Roberts’ humdrum script into something memorably humane.

The Last American Hero: GROOVY

Footsteps (1972)

          Nominated for a Golden Globe as the best TV movie of its year, Footstepsis a hard-driving character drama set in the competitive world of college football. Yet instead of focusing on the tribulations of athletes, as is the norm for the genre, Footstepsexplores the psychology of a ruthless coach whose belligerence, drinking, and shady ethics have made him a pariah among top schools. Richard Crenna, putting his customary intensity to great use, stars as Paddy O’Connor, a cocky ex-player with a good record of guiding teams toward victory, but a bad record of holding onto jobs.
          When the movie begins, he arrives in a small Southwestern town to start work as a defensive coordinator at a regional college. Since the school’s head coach, Jonas Kane (Clu Gulager), once played for O’Connor, O’Connor bristles at taking orders from a former subordinate. O’Connor also angles for Kane’s job, sleeps with Kane’s secretary to get inside information, cozies up to a deep-pocketed sponsor (Forrest Tucker) in order to have a star player moved to defense, and makes passes at Kane’s girlfriend, beautiful drama teacher Sarah Allison (Joanna Pettet). For a while, O’Connor gets away with his behavior by delivering a winning season, but things come to a head when moral crises reveal how conscience sometimes inhibits ambition.

          Although it suffers from brevity, running the standard 74 minutes for a ’70s TV movie, Footsteps is quite solid. Featuring a script co-written by future Oscar winner Alvin Sargent, the movie has several compelling confrontations. Moreover, the O’Connor character is such a force of nature that it’s fascinating to parse how much of his act is bluster and how much is justifiable confidence. Though generally not the deepest actor, Crenna slips into this role comfortably and delivers a virile performance. The supporting cast is fine as well, with Bill Overton doing strong work as O’Connor’s star player. (Ned Beatty is wasted in a tiny role.) Veteran TV director Paul Wendkos accentuates the story’s inherent tension with tight compositions placing actors in close proximity, and the filmmakers employ trippy effects like solarization and split-screens to enliven big-game montages that were obviously cobbled together from stock footage.

Footsteps: GROOVY