Vigilante Force
Vigilante Force | |
---|---|
Directed by | George Armitage |
Written by | George Armitage |
Produced by | Gene Corman |
Starring | Kris Kristofferson Jan-Michael Vincent |
Cinematography | William Cronjager |
Edited by | Morton Tubor |
Music by | Gerald Fried |
Distributed by | United Artists |
Release date | August 29, 1976 (US) |
Running time | 89 minutes |
Language | English |
Vigilante Force is a 1976 American action film directed by George Armitage and starring Kris Kristofferson and Jan-Michael Vincent. The plot concerns a Vietnam War veteran and his buddies, who are hired by his brother and others in a small California town for protection from rowdy oil-field workers.
Tagline
- They called it God's country ... until all hell broke loose.
- They hired themselves a hero ... and bought themselves a world of trouble.
Plot
When a small California town is overrun with unruly and rowdy behavior from oil-field workers, Ben Arnold (
Cast
- Kris Kristofferson - Aaron Arnold
- Jan-Michael Vincent - Ben Arnold
- Victoria Principal - Linda Christopher
- Bernadette Peters - Little Dee
- Brad Dexter - Mayor Bradford
- Judson Pratt - Harry Lee
- David Doyle- Homer Arno
- Antony Carbone - Freddie Howe
- Andrew Stevens - Paul Sinton
- Shelly Novack - D.O. Viner
Production
The film was directed by George Armitage, who says producer Gene Corman came to him with just the title.[1]
Armitage credits the quality of the stunts to Buddy Joe Hooker, stuntman.
That was a 30-day film, but it would be 60 days today because of the stunts and the pyrotechnics. We had Roger George, who was quite a well-known special effects man. It went really well, though we had one little mishap that wasn't really our fault—in the final shootout we blew up a blue van that was parked over an oil pipeline, so after the initial explosion the oil pipeline caught fire.[1]
Armitage says Jan Michael Vincent's character Ben Arnold was named after
The entire movie is full of these very slightly coded reference to the Revolutionary War ... [although] What I was really doing there was Vietnam. What would it be like if people took over your town, as we had been doing to the hamlets of Vietnam? What if we brought Vietnam back to America, what would that be like? That's kind of what we were going after, but since the Bicentennial year was coming on and bringing a lot of revisionist history with it, I thought I'd include a little Revolutionary War in the recipe. I've always tried to include something subversive, not hidden from anyone, just for my own interests.[1]
The production designer was Jack Fisk. "We had absolutely no money, no budget, but Jack did extraordinary things—and Sissy Spacek was our assistant art director on that," said Armitage.[1] Armitage says that once Kris Kristofferson agreed to do the film "everybody else followed. Bernadette [Peters] wanted to work with him, Victoria [Principal], and Jan-Michael came over ... It was a good shoot, but it was rough. It was 30 days, it was 108 degrees in the Simi Valley, so a lot of it was tough to do. But we worked through it, finished on time and under budget."[1]
Reception
The
According to Contemporary North American Film Directors, the plot was a not-too-subtle satire on the American way. The studio disliked the film and it was a commercial failure.[3]
On
References
- ^ a b c d e Nick Pinkerton (April 28, 2015). "Interview with George Armitage". Film Comment. Retrieved September 11, 2021.
- Time Out New York. Archived from the originalon 27 December 2010.
- ISBN 1-903364-52-3
- ^ "Vigilante Force". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 2021-09-11.
- ^ "Vetsploitation. List by Jarrett". Letterboxd. 2018. Retrieved February 17, 2024.
- ^ "Category. Vetsploitation. From The Grindhouse Cinema Database". The Grindhouse Cinema Database. February 4, 2024. Retrieved February 5, 2024.