Poster Artwork
After being shot down during Operation Rolling Thunder and spending seven long, torturous years in North Vietnam’s Hanoi Hilton, Major Charles Rane is brought home to a hero’s welcome and into the arms of a changed family and society. His wife, now committed to the town sheriff, asks for a divorce and his young son only knows of Charles but recognizes the sheriff as his true father figure. Feeling like there’s no place left for him, Charles moves into the shed behind his home and resumes the daily routine that preserved his sanity during his prison camp internment.
As if the pain of losing years out of his life and his family to another man weren’t enough, a group of lowlives take Charles and his family hostage hoping to steal a case of two thousand silver dollars, each coin representing one day locked away as a P.O.W.. Humiliated, tortured and mutilated, Charles falls back on his military training and refuses to tell them where the case is hidden but his young son has no such training. They quickly secure the case and execute Charles and his family in cold blood to eliminate any witnesses.
When you gun down a man and his family, you’d better make damn sure you do the job right. Charles miraculously survives the deadly encounter and prepares himself to wage a new war. With gleaming hook ready, weapons fully loaded and a devoted barmaid in tow, the grieving veteran hits the road in his fiery red Cadillac with one thing on his mind…payback.
Classic revenge! Despite this film’s status and its influence on many famous personalities and cinema, Rolling Thunder has yet to see a legit DVD/BRD release here in the states, which is a crying shame. I can’t say I’m a fan of William Devane’s work but this is undoubtedly his best (that I’ve seen) and to have had a powerhouse like Paul Schrader co-writing this and Dabney Coleman and Tommy Lee Jones co-starring, it’s mind-boggling that think this is languishing in a vault somewhere, slowly degrading.
I was able to catch this film on Comcast’s Action on Demand (Impact) and though I was initially skeptical that Devane could hold down the entire film on his own as lead, it didn’t take long to convince me otherwise. Devane delivered a brilliant performance as a man who outwardly appears to be in control but inwardly is coming apart at the seams, a man totally incapable of adjusting to the strange new world he’s been brought back to. He’s a warrior with nothing to fight for and a man damaged beyond repair. I’m not sure whether anybody else will catch this or not because it was subtle (or purposely downplayed?) but I wonder if those of you that have seen this caught the sexual tension between Devane and Jones’s characters? There’s a point in the film in which Tommy Lee Jones admits to having a hard time adjusting to his new life and to making love to a woman, which to me indicated that he’d become accustomed during his internment to the comforts of a man. Perhaps Devane’s Rane?
Rolling Thunder is a fantastic film. It’s obviously a low budget production but it worked and though the action really doesn’t kick in until the final quarter, when it does the body count skyrockets. While some may unjustly dismiss this as nothing more than a Death Wish rip-off, there’s far more going for Rolling Thunder than just exploitation; it’s a tense, brutal affair that touches on subjects like honor, duty, justice, friendship, infidelity and the psychological cost of war.
And there’s some sweet hook-the-the-balls action! If you can catch this On Demand, check it out. If you’re able to locate a clean gray market disc, I would definitely add it to my collection if I were you.
