White Line Fever

Carrol Jo Hummer (Jan-Michael Vincent) returns home from the Air Force to marry Jerri (Kay Lenz). He borrows money to buy an used truck to be an independent trucker. He seeks work from his late father's partner Duane Haller (Slim Pickens) but he finds the business corrupt. Carrol Jo is unwilling to haul contrabands and gets beaten up by thugs. He is blackballed and decides to fight back.

It's a little ridiculous that he gets a load from Buck. It would be easy for them to call the corrupt cop and plant something on him. This gets geared up quickly. The danger starts high and has trouble going higher. They can't start with violence, corrupt cop, and a powerful cabal, then scheme a setup. The setup could have been great but they let him off too easily. Carrol Jo is not particularly smart. Once the killings start, it's time to go Rambo. There is a potential for this to be Rambo but the movie can't let him kill. It's a little infuriating. This should be about a lone driver being driven to take revenge on his tormentors. Instead, this insists on a man of the people movie. There is an obvious edit decision. When he's the lone Rambo at the end, Pops is riding shotgun in one of the action scenes. That's obviously from the earlier ride. His final rampage is not nearly enough and again he's not allowed to kill. This story is begging for revenge but it insists on justice.

The director Jonathan Kaplan also signs this hideous screenplay aimed for suckers and less enlightened concerning the harder life of truck drivers, I coming from a long generation of these tough road workers, I know how it works, this picture tries by all means establish a clash between the powerful ones against the poorest truck drivers, what world they living anyway? There are not any matter between them that the movie tried hard implied, as not mentioned regarding the low pricing of shipment should be the main matter, whereof never was allowed to argue on the far-fetched plot.

I saw the glorious and classic Blue Mule in great shape, another fabulous trucks appears on the picture, what brute ones, a breathtaking and might Arizona landscape portraits on movie including rarely seen a snowy monument valley, worthwhile see for it plenty, however the plot looks like a three dollar bill as cited in my title review, what a wasting of gift actors as the Slim Pickens well portraits as true Arizona's boss, the womanizer L. Q. Jones, the skinny Kay Lens, the amusing joke teller Sam Laws and the forthcoming star Jan Michael Vincent, a bit naïve guy who bursts the GH's sign on glass tower headquarter, aside Convoy that is really is emblematic trucks movie, White Line Fever is among the best as action picture only, forget the contrived and phony storyline.

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First watch: 1984 / How many: 3 / Source: TV-Youtube / Rating: 6.

This came out with the CB fad and is really a vintage film now. Is it a classic? Well, the truck driving scenes are classic. The other stuff like the plot and ending are apparently fabricated just so we could have a place for the great action. Where else can you see someone climb from the cab of a moving truck onto the van trailer's roof? Where else can you see a semi hit a bobtail truck tractor in the tandems and spin it off the road? Where else can you see a diesel truck burn? Where else can you see a truck tractor jump through the air? Jan-Michael Vincent shows us he can actually back a semi to a loading dock, too. White Line Fever gets the point across that truck driving is a great way of life. Then why was it so hard for him to make a living at it? Couldn't he just sign up with Mayflower Van Lines or something?

A standard but enjoyable trucking flick of the mid 1970s, this makes up for in action what it lacks in scale and budget. The plot is pretty simplistic, with Jan-Michael Vincent playing a new trucker trying to organise union power with his co-workers and fight the corrupt bosses. Lots of driving, chasing, and some good old-fashioned fighting, and it's all light and harmless with it.

My dad took me to see this movie in the theater in 1975. I was around 7 years old. I guess I remember it most because it was one of the first movies my dad took me to see. It is definitely a tough guys movie. The violence portrayed in the film stayed with me for years. Especially the scene where Slim Pickens is thrown in front of a speeding semi truck. I've seen the movie many times on television since 1975 and have grown to appreciate it more. Not being close to the trucking industry, I don't know how accurate a picture it paints for today, but I believe it hits pretty close for 1975.