Rolling Thunder

How to convey hollowness? A frozen core? Must be a very tough exercise for an actor. Merely sitting still with a blank expression is relatively easy. Believably displaying an dispassionate exterior and simultaneously conveying a crushing sense of loss: loss of loved ones and things, but also of purpose and even self, is much more difficult. I have seen several actors try to pull this off. Usually, it is after their characters are victims of some unspeakable crime, something that perhaps robbed them of all their worth. William Devane nails it. As Major Charles Rane in the 1977 drama ROLLING THUNDER, he expresses a powerfully emotional emotionlessness. It suits this character, as he spent years as a POW during the Vietnam conflict. Years of unspeakable tortures, physical and otherwise have cost him his soul, perhaps.

If the military turned him into a empathy-free killing machine during basic training, his field experience at the Hanoi hotel expanded and completed the task. Rane returns home to Texas to find his wife engaged to a local policeman, and a young son who doesn't remember him. The steely exterior doesn't flinch. After his wife delivers the sad news, Rane merely deadpans, "I'm just gonna sit here..". Ice cold. But we also glimpse the Major retreating to his garage nightly for a ritual of self-inflicted torture, brutal lashings that mirror the thousands of days of abuse he received back East at the hands of the Vietnamese. Therapy? Penance? Devane's visage reveals everything and nothing. To be exact, the Major spent 2,554 days as a prisoner. His hometown welcomes him back as a hero, giving him almost as many silver dollars for each day (plus one for good luck) and a red Cadillac as a thank-you. This does not go unnoticed by a couple of local scumbags, who with a pair of Mexican toughs attack and kill Rane's family while they attempt to retrieve the money from his homestead. Rane survives the attack, but only after his right hand is forced into the garbage disposal. Mangled beyond repair. A rather sharp prosthesis will soon take its place. 

Another soldier returned from 'Nam with Rane back to Texas. His name is Sergeant First Class Johnny Vohden. Like Rane, he is shell shocked beyond any trace of the man he might have once been. Tommy Lee Jones likewise completely, believably conveys a transparency that is almost eerie. As director John Flynn frames the Vohden dinner table, surrounded by hapless relatives who attempt to praise the soldier, we only stare on this poor soul, lost in a wilderness beyond grief, beyond care. Vohden is all too aware, however, of how trivial civilian life seems to be as he listens to his family's rants and bellyaches. Scenes like this fill many movies detailing the travails of soldiers returning home, but Jones and Devane seemed to have tapped into a dimension of catatonia that makes their performances seem intuitive. Far more than other acting I've seen. All that seems to motivate them is justice. This will come served up to the deserving via good old fashioned vengeance. 

The deserving, of course, are the vile quartet who wiped out the remnants of the Major's earlier life. What if this had not have happened? What if the Major had gone on to see his wife marry another man and his son just continue to be a stranger? Or would he even have cared? Such feelings are complex, but something motivates (call it pure get what you give) Rane to call up Vohden to assist him in meting out some ultra-violent payback. It gets really ugly, viewer. No cheeks are turned here. There's a reason why Rane's new right appendage is featured so prominently in the film's publicity stills and posters. This also being an exploitation picture from the 70s, you expect some bloodletting. 

You might also expect some sex, but in an interesting turn, ROLLING THUNDER (co-written by Paul Schrader) subverts our expectations and stays true to its characters. The silver coins I mentioned had been handed out to Rane by a local waitress named Linda. She had had a crush on Rane for many years and even wore a bracelet in his honor while he was away. She attempts to comfort Rane after his tragedies, but the man is on a single track. He can't seem to feel anything otherwise, and dalliances would just be a waste of time. Linda is persistent, and eventually accompanies the man on a road trip to Mexico, unaware of its purpose. Along the way, Rane softens a bit, even opens up about his earlier life, but only for an instant. There's business at hand. A local cathouse will be the stage for a gory wrap-up.

ROLLING THUNDER first came to my attention as a trailer before one of my many viewings of STAR WARS when I was a kid. The trailer was so vivid. It filled our young, naive hearts hearts with some sort of unhealthy rush. I recall lots of kids in the theater collectively "ooo"ing. We were excited, but my excitement was short-lived, knowing even then that there wasn't a snowball's chance of my seeing it anytime soon. It would take over 30 years, in fact. On a laptop. This movie has yet to receive an official DVD release.  Bring out the petitions! 

An interesting bit of trivia: Quentin Tarantino so loved this movie that he named one of his distribution companies (the one resposnible for re-releasing old Bs like SWITCHBLADE SISTERS) after it: "Rolling Thunder Pictures". A hook is its logo.