Joe (1970)

It is a performances centric movie

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Melissa Compton (Susan Sarandon) lives with her junkie boyfriend Frank Russo. Her parents Bill and Joan are rich New Yorkers. Melissa goes crazy in a store and is taken to a hospital. Bill confronts and kills Frank in a rage. Bill wanders into a bar in a daze and meets niger-hating, hippie-hating loud-mouth factory worker Joe Curran (Peter Boyle). Bill confesses to the killing but passes it off as a joke. Later, Joe sees news reports about the killing and befriends the assumed killer Bill.A young Sarandon has a minor role but it's Peter Boyle who gives the powerful performance. It's a rather slow movie for the most part. Boyle is like a coiled cobra waiting to strike. He spits his hate and flashes his guns like a cobra's fangs. It's not until the last act where he finally explodes into an orgy of violence as well as an actual sex orgy.

John G. Avildsen directed Norman Wexler's inflammatory script about a middle-aged "square," who, after accidentally killing his daughter's pusher/lover, teams up with a bigoted blue collar nitwit (the title character played with a lot of bravado by Peter Boyle) with tragic results. They commiserate and find common ground in their intolerance of ANYTHING they're not: liberals; blacks; the young. A time-capsule of the early 1970s, this plays like an R-rated version of ALL IN THE FAMILY with Boyle playing Archie Bunker with guns. The acting is all first rate...not only by Boyle, but by Dennis Patrick, Susan Sarandon and, at least briefly, Patrick McDermott as one of the most unlikeable victims in movie history. A violent, unforgiving film. It's certainly unsettling but what is it telling us? It's OK to have junkies & pushers running rampant as long as they're peace-loving? It's become a classic.

The story is simple. A racist blue collar guy recruits a wealthy white man to kill hippies, This is also the first motion picture for Susan Sarandon and the flick that made Peter Boyle an actor who worked a lot and made his name.This film I found greatly upsetting and I remember when it premiered at the Harvsrd Square theater in Cambridge, Mass. when I was still in high school. I never understood why such a movie would be popular with the very group it excoriates. Maybe it was a primer for those who wanted to avoid such psychotic baddies. When I first heard of the film, I had no idea that the composer of the music in it would become a close friend, supporter and benefactor. I also never envisioned being treated as something nasty on his shoe by the star, but these two things did occur.But back to the film. It seems all too real and the rich man turned killer by the protagonist/antagonist played a racist in an episode of All In The Family as well.I can't give away the finale of this movie except to say that it is rather abrupt and, unless you are a sociopath, unsettling to say the least.The N word is one of the most offensive things in this films the swear words are mild compared to some other films. This was, I believe, the film that introduced the future director of Rocky.But Bobby Scott's music as always is remarkable. Scott is a name that should be better known and I do hope people will try to find as much as they can about this Irish/Native American super talent, As for Peter Boyle, I wish I had told him of my friendship with Bobby and that he should not look at me as some sort of annoying gnat. After all, it is my friend's work that is the best thing in this film that gave Boyle his career. Talent is a wonderful thing, but humility should come along with it towards the people who made you a celebrity in the first place. Jerry Orbach thought that way. We could all learn from this.

Susan Sarandon, the pure garbage that she is, portrays a woman who is pure garbage. Not much of a stretch there.Boyle, another bleeding heart, has the role of evil Right-Wing avenger.Boyle learns that a man has accidentally killed the piece-of-crap hippy who was slowly killing the man's piece-of-crap daughter (Sarandon) with drugs. The movie tells us that it is wrong to interfere with your daughter's slide into drug addiction, alcoholism and promiscuity. Hey, they have their rights, man.Sarandon takes her clothes off a lot because hey, that's good acting.Boyle hates everybody because hey, that's an honest portrayal of what was once called the Silent Majority.Eventually Boyle abandons everything he believes in. Despite his intense hate, all of a sudden, hey, them hippies look good.Then he goes wild and kills everybody in sight.Speaking as a former hippy, I remember that fathers tended to get upset when their daughters turned into drug-addled whores. I seem to remember that even the liberal pinko Dads didn't like their daughters being used as catatonic semen receptacles, the type of role, by the way, that Sarandon was born to play.Boyle, the great actor albeit liberal freak that he is, expressed great displeasure that audiences sided with his character. Apparently, it is wrong to get robbed and try to retrieve your wallet. Apparently, it is wrong to protect your daughter.Just like Easy Rider, every hippy in this movie is a complete waste.And just like in Easy Rider, the best scene is at the end where the hippies die.Joe gets 9 stars because lots and lots of hippies die.It loses a star because some of them survive.For all those who feel that this movie is an honest portrayal of anything, let this hippy give you the old three-fingered peace sign.And now it's time to tune in, turn on, and drop out.Groovy, baby.P.S. The ORIGINAL spelling was "hippy." Blame the establishment for the nonsensical variation, "hippie."