Billy Jack

[Synnical]

I just re-watched the 1971 movie today after datasuspect posted a pic of Tom Laughlin here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=105&topic_id=3818361#3818744


It doesn't suck (it's also not great, but still compelling) and is still relevant today. 'Cause Native Americans are still getting the shaft from the Federal government and it talks to social concerns about prejudice that still exist, not to mention war . . .

I thought Tom Laughlin did a terrific job of underplaying the role as an anti-hero.

From the Netflix sleeve:

Billy Jack
He's a warrior, a mystic and a martyr, capturing the heart and soul of a generation. Embodying all of this and more Billy Jack quickly became one of the most unorthodox and magnetic movie heroes of all time. Tom Laughlin charismatically plays the title character, a half-breed Native American and ex-Green Beret returning to live in solitude on an Arizona reservation. He is drawn to the progressive Freedom School - and the idealistic woman (Delores Taylor) who runs it. But when tensions flare between the students and narrow-minded local bigots, Billy Jack becomes the school's protector. Once again, violence finds him.
First released with little fanfare and dismissed by most critics, the film's gut honesty struck a chord with audiences, who later made it a box-office gi...

The sleeve cuts off there. I checked boxofficemojo.com and no info is listed as to how much money the film made - it was an Indy film and some of it was ad-libbed, or so I understand.

I really enjoyed the "street theater" scene. Very funny and poignant.


Some recent member reviews at Netflix:

http://www.netflix.com/MovieDisplay?movieid=307842&trkid=90529&dmode=CUSTOMERREVIEW&lnkctr=mdptabMemberRev&n=1

The naivete of the politics in this movie was infuriating even then ... anyone watching it today probably feels like these people were from another planet. But there's the movie around Billy Jack, and there's Billy Jack himself, so you have to dig for the gold. Billy is an odd, tortured soul, a man searching for inner peace but consumed by violent undertones. He has found something he WANTS to believe in, but secretly doesn't. You can't fault him for wanting to do the right thing ... he wants to help people ... he just only knows one way. Billy Jack created a generation of martial artists in a different way than Bruce Lee or Chuck Norris could ... and for that, we owe him thanks.

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Go ahead and call me crazy. I will testify in the end, Billy Jack remains a good movie. It's dated, it's got a few moments that are maudlin, but mostly it is an effective, exciting, well-meaning message film. The DVD presentation (with almost no extras) is a stunning transfer. There are some beautiful shots in the film I'd forgotten about.

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"Billy Jack" is not just a hippie anti-establishment film. It is a treatise on the Jungian philosophy of the duality of man. Our hero, Billy Jack, a green-beret Vietnam Veteran, is struggling with the two sides of his nature. One side is the trained killer, who feels honor bound to fight and defend. The other side is the humanist who wants to live in peace with the land, the horses and his fellow men. Billy's girlfriend Jean, a self proclaimed pacifist and the founder of a racially mixed "Montessori-type" school for disenfranchised youth, continually begs Billy to give up his violent ways and turn the other cheek. Her "live and let live" attitude is met with opposition from the people of the town, who suspect that the "Freedom School" is nothing but a hippie drug colony. Billy finds himself at the center of the confrontation. Because Jean and the children will not, or cannot, defend themselves, Billy acts as their guardian "arch-angel" bringing down vengeance on the worst of the antagonists. Even after Billy tries to bring peace to his soul by undertaking a Native American spiritual quest, he is forced into situations where he must act as protector of the children. In one scene he does manage to thwart the "bad guy" in a non-violent manner, solely because Jean is present. Eventually Billy loses the battle against the dark side of his nature, resulting in a
stand-off with the police. But the war continues.

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Why is it that the harshest critics are illiterate? I have seen Billy Jack nearly 50 times. It was released when I was about 9, and I saw it in the theater first. I now have two copies, one DVD and the other copied from Joe Bob Briggs' late night TV show - because he (Briggs) did a live phone interview with Tom Laughlin during the commercial breaks. In a nut shell, this film is about being human, and treating others humanely. We all have to live on this planet, at least for now. The sooner we learn to treat each other the way we would want them to treat us, the sooner we'll have a world worth living in. THAT is the message of this movie. Yes, I know Tom Laughlin doesn't look like he has any Native American blood in him, and the camera crews didn't know how to shoot a martial arts scene, but that is to be expected for a low-budget indie film. What made it work for me was that the writing actually made me care about the THEME of the show. 9/10

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This may be one of those "must-see" films for those interested in the youth subcultures of the Vietnam-era. This film should NOT be viewed as an action movie (as a kung-fu fan, I should know). Rather, it is meant to be a drama (which is why various other reviewers complain about "slow parts"). The action sequences are quite limited and simple compared with the Asian films of the 70s and beyond. No, what makes this a good movie is that some minor independent production group did their best to have an impact on audiences of the time. Conservatives were infuriated, and youthful liberals were inspired!! I am particularly impressed by how REAL some of the acting and staging appears. Reviewers here who complain about "hippie singing" must be corrected. There are only one or two brief songs being performed, and these are vitally important to the cultural setting that is being portrayed. Probably the film's biggest flaw is that one or two of the antagonist characters are a bit flat and overdone. But the lead lady gives a REALLY earnest portrayal that really moved me. I found the way that the film addressed the dilemmas of violence and "heroism" to be particularly appropriate even today in an era when violence as entertainment is pervasive. Some of the scenes look quite unstaged, and while this may stike some viewers as being amateurish, it strikes me as having a rather realistic effect in which people must search for the right words to express themselves...and not always get them exactly right. Those scenes of improvisation are one of the film's strong points, which should add to its earnestness and relevance to audiences, because not everything is neatly staged and written, and not all the performers are giving the same old, carefully rehearsed script readings that fill most movies. Lots of credit for moxie and creativity, and the theme song is great: echt early 70s!!! (NOTE: Would be rated R if released today, for scenes of nudity/sexual assault)

[teach1st]

1. I still like the first Billy Jack movie

Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of Heaven,
You can justify it in the end.
There won't be any trumpets blowing
Come the judgement day,
On the bloody morning after....
One tin soldier rides away.

[Synnical]

2. There was a second one? n/t

[KG]

3. The Trial of Billy Jack

[teach1st]

4. Without Googling...

I think there was more than one sequel. The first sequel had to do with a girl on a Vespa who was threatened by a tripped-out motorcycle gang. Then there was Billy Jack Goes to Washington.

[teach1st]

5. The Billy Jack web site...

http://www.billyjack.com/

Delores Taylor and Tom Laughlin ask you to join them in launching a National 5-Event/5-Step Crusade to End the War in Iraq and Restore America to its Moral Purpose

Taylor and Laughlin, who disdain both political Parties as systemically corrupt, announce they launching a 5 Major Event/5-Step National Crusade to Restore America to its Moral Purpose by making America aware there is a realistic Exit Plan immediately available to stop the daily bloodbath in Iraq and replace our troops with Iraqi-welcomed coalition forces, culminating in their new explosive Billy Jack.

[Synnical]

6. Thanks

I think your link should go to to GD or GD Politics. Care to post it there?

[The Straight Story]

7. I have all the DVDs (4) and his books autographed by Tom

The 4th movie was bad, but still fun to watch :) 'Billy Jack goes to Washington'.

The books were good though, entertaining at least...

The movie his son made sucked, but was cool in some ways.

[Synnical]

10. Google search

For what it's worth. The first movie stands on its own.

http://movies.yahoo.com/shop?d=hc&id=1800036698&cf=biog&intl=us

In the late '60s, former bit player and juvenile actor Tom Laughlin created a new kind of antihero and launched three low-budget films featuring Billy Jack, an enigmatic Anglo-Native American, ex-Green Beret/biker loner who used considerable martial arts skills to pound his pacifistic principles into the skulls of his adversaries. Laughlin made his screen debut in 1956, playing small parts first in These Wilder Years and then in Tea and Sympathy. The first leg of Laughlin's career lasted through the early '60s, when he left Hollywood to run a Montessori preschool. He returned to movies in 1965, this time as a director, cinematographer, editor, writer, and an actor. Working on a low-budget independently of major studios and utilizing several pseudonyms on the credits -- including T.C. Frank, Donald Henderson, Lloyd E.

His alter ego, Billy Jack, made his debut in the exploitation biker pic Born Losers. In 1971, Laughlin released Billy Jack which starred himself and his wife, Delores Taylor. Initially released through American International Pictures (the company that distributed Born Losers), the film was picked up by Fox and then by Warner Bros. Laughlin regained control of the film by 1972 and marketed it and the sequel, The Trial of Billy Jack, by renting over a 1,000 theaters (known as "four-walling") and releasing the films simultaneously while saturating the market with an agressive multimedia advertising campaign. The technique brought results: The sequel grossed between 22 and 30 million dollars in a month and the recently re-re-released original grossed even more. The success of these gritty, critically panned, low-budget films was in large part due to the social unrest of the early '70s, when young audiences were looking for idealistic antiheroes to fight the immovable Establishment. The film's success led Laughlin and wife Taylor to create the ambitious Billy Jack Enterprises which Laughlin and associates envisioned as an empire comprised of record, book, and film subsidiaries that they would use to "change the world," making it a better place for "the little guy." At one time, Laughlin announced his intention to purchase the CBS West Coast Production Center. Unfortunately for Laughlin, times were indeed changing and his third series entry, Billy Jack Goes to Washington, was so over-earnest and unsubtle that it was barely released. His first non-Billy Jack movie, The Master Gunfighter (1975), was a virtual atom bomb at the box office. By 1976, Billy Jack Enterprises was on the brink of ruin. Still, Laughlin managed to hang on and his company survived, though it was not as big as it once was. He continues to work as an occasional actor and to promote himself as an expert in Jungian psychology, a major innovator in the rise in American independent films, and an instigator of social reform. He announced an interest in running for president in 1992. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

[Synnical]

8. One Tin Soldier

http://www.grhouse.org/soldier1.mp3

Thanks to Nomad559

Lyrics:

Listen, children, to a story
That was written long ago,
'Bout a kingdom on a mountain
And the valley-folk below.

On the mountain was a treasure
Buried deep beneath the stone,
And the valley-people swore
They'd have it for their very own.

Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of Heaven,
You can justify it in the end.
There won't be any trumpets blowing
Come the judgment day,
On the bloody morning after....
One tin soldier rides away.

So the people of the valley
Sent a message up the hill,
Asking for the buried treasure,
Tons of gold for which they'd kill.

Came an answer from the kingdom,
"With our brothers we will share
All the secrets of our mountain,
All the riches buried there."


Now the valley cried with anger,
"Mount your horses! Draw your sword!"
And they killed the mountain-people,
So they won their just reward.

Now they stood beside the treasure,
On the mountain, dark and red.
Turned the stone and looked beneath it...
"Peace on Earth" was all it said.

Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of Heaven,
You can justify it in the end.
There won't be any trumpets blowing
Come the judgment day,
On the bloody morning after....
One tin soldier rides away.

[CanuckAmok]

9. To paraphrase the Vogons:

"...'It is a treatise on the Jungian philosophy of the duality of man'?! Death's too good for 'em!"