Engel der Hölle

For some reason, I remember this as being the target of jokes and sneers when it was new.

Making sure to avoid prejudice, wanting to see it myself and know for sure, I recorded it when it premiered on Turner Classic Movies so I could watch in the right mood.

What a pleasant surprise it turned out to be.

To the best of my weakening memory, I don't believe I've ever seen Tom Laughlin and now I wonder why.

First, he was a really good-looking guy, and he was a very pleasant personality on screen. He should have become a major player.

Elizabeth James might not have been the best actress around in the '60s and '70s, but my gosh was she a looker. She had a fit, athletic presence, and just glowed on the screen, and she should also have been a major player.

And why isn't there more information about her? She seems a fascinating person.

Not such a surprise, but really deserving prominent mention, was Jane Russell's performance.

She has not been treated with the respect I think she deserves, having not completely recovered from the "wouldn't you like to tussle with Russell?" PR nonsense from her first movie, "The Outlaw." But she was, frankly, great in this small part. Actually, she had been turning in great performances for a long time, and she has been great because she made the effort to become an actress, and not just coast on her looks.

Jeremy Slate was so good in his villainous role, his character was almost admirable, almost likable. The man is a standout in any movie he is in. He's been gone a little more than two years now, and he left a void.

Let's be honest: The script could have used a good editor. There were some hokey moments that could have been fixed with just a little effort before production.

But all in all, this is a good movie, within the context of what it tried to do and be.

Now I look forward to seeing the other "Billy Jack" movies.

While the acting and plot were weak, this movie is worth watching, if only to educate or remind us of the tumultuous 60s... with the ending of the Vietnam War, Hells Angels, drugs-sex-and-rock-n-roll... in a society where returning Vietnam Vets were considered renegades and loose cannons or just plain crazy... in a society where we screamed peace, while resorting to violence... in a society where women's lib was just beginning to surface in the American Consciousness, with the burning of the bras... in a society where the youth of our country cried out against the "establishment", and we "did our own thing"... where altruism flourished along with the rise in cults, crusading preachers, and activism... in a time when man first walked on the moon... when we, as a society believed... nothing at all could stop us. In all, the movie depicted well the general atmosphere of beliefs and attitudes of the times, that, while they might seem moronic to us in today's world, perhaps, 30 years in the future, our attitudes and beliefs will seem moronic to the generations to follow.

Contrary to one reviewer's information, "Born Losers" was a smash at the box office the FIRST time it was released in '67. And it's easy to see why. It's the most entertaining of the "biker movie" genre, because it has a story and vivid characters. Elizabeth James is Vicky Barrington, a vacationing college student who comes up against a nasty motorcycle gang in a California mountain town. Naturally, the gang, headed by a weathered Jeremy Slate, take off after Vicky (who is on a motorcycle wearing white boots and a matching bikini) and two of them eventually catch and rape her. She's not the only victim. Three incredibly foolish local girls visit the gang's "clubhouse" and meet a similar fate. But they don't have a champion like Tom Laughlin (in his first appearance as Billy Jack) who manages to get Vicky out of danger (at least for a while) and subsequently falls in love with her. "Born Losers" has a great score by "Wild Angels" composer (and future Lieutenant Governor of California) Mike Curb, good acting by a large cast, and a fine cameo appearance by Jane Russell as the trashy mother of one of the victimized girls. Add some beautiful locations and some slick motorcycle stunts, and you have a "Born Winner!" Incidentally, beautiful Ms. James turned up as a police dispatcher in the seventies cult classic, "Dirty Mary Crazy Larry". She also wrote the screenplay for "Born Losers" (under the pen name 'E. James Lloyd').

Given its low budget, this is not a bad movie. A motorcycle gang, led by the scruffy Jeremy Slate, terrorizes a small California town, and in the process rapes several college girls. There's lots of tough talk, motorcycle noise, and violence, as you would expect for a biker film.

Of course, to balance out all the villainous mayhem, you gotta have a hero on the scene. And for the era in which the film was made, there was no better hero than the charismatic loner, half-breed Billy Jack, played with serene gusto by Tom Laughlin. He's a one-man show of moral and physical strength, as he outwits and outfights the biker roughnecks. The film makes the point that bad parenting and ineptness in traditional law enforcement foster an environment conducive to delinquency.

Interestingly, although this is the first Billy Jack film, Laughlin played a similar role ten years earlier, in a movie called "The Delinquents" (1957). His character was Scotty, a good guy teenager who gets mixed up with a bunch of high school hoodlums. Whereas in "The Delinquents" all the villains are kids who drive around in jalopies, in "The Born Losers", the kids have grown into adults who ride motorcycles.

In "The Born Losers" the characters tend to be stereotypes. In a time period that immediately preceded the women's lib movement, the film's female characters are very, very subservient. The film's plot does depend on contrivances to some extent. Dialogue lacks subtext. Production design is ... colorful. And the costumes reek of late 60's garish "hip" (love those pink walls and pink clothes), all perfectly in sync with the Age of Aquarius. Tom Laughlin's direction is excellent. Color cinematography is very good. The outdoor scenery is wonderful, as is the music in the opening title sequence.

I've seen a number of biker films. "The Born Losers" is one of the best. It was highly successful at the box office, and led to later Billy Jack films. It has a cinematic style that is almost iconoclastic; not insignificantly, it preceded "Easy Rider" by a couple of years. Such was the impact of "The Born Losers".

If you like Billy Jack, this is for you. Over 2 hours of a leading actress that can't act, a leading man who stands still without expression, and an inane group of men who are supposed to be dangerous because they are slightly bizarre. Sprinkle in ten minutes of Billy kicking big donkey, and you have the formula.

Tom Laughlin knew a winner when he saw one and would use the main elements of this film in all of his future Billy Jack movies. In later films, his real-life wife would take over the role of the leading actress that can't act.

This is a very low-budget movie. Future Billy Jack against the world movies had a couple more bucks. But true to form, as in all Billy Jack movies, there is no competent acting anywhere.

Personally, none of this stuff turns me off of Billy Jack movies. In one movie, I see it for the gas station scene. In another, I want to see Billy put his right foot up against the guy's left ear. In a third, I want to see him shoot it out.

For an anti-war pinko, Laughlin sure knows how to create some nice fight scenes. If the man would have moved a few more times per pic, he would have been a major star. But his style is to stand around for most of the movie with a deadpan expression, and then finally kick some butt.

The Billy Jack movies are a lot like chitlins, limburger cheese, or kim chee. If you like that stuff, you don't mind the smell.

This one stinks to high heaven.

But it's a Billy Jack stink.