Joe (1970) - John G. Avildsen

For the last 30 years the line has typically been "before Rocky, there was Joe". The winds of change were blowing, and it seems just as Gimme Shelter showed the hippy dream to be dying, Joe seemed to capitalize on it. The film is somewhat tricky to read. Because of our association with two middle aged conservative characters, we're likely to take the film as a conservative picture. However the moral of the story condemns this radical conservative violence. Watching the film, and in particular Peter Boyle's career best performance I can't help but cheer Joe as much as he repulses me. He is a disgusting man, a loud mouth, and some of his ideas are just plain wrong. However I can't help but chuckle as he complains of the current state of music blaming it on "@#%$ loving hippies". 

What's remarkable about Joe is that despite being the title character over twenty minutes of the film go by before we even glimpse him, and without knowing the actor, he isn't really introduced. We simply regard him as a drunkard spouting the type of drunk rhetoric typical of a working class man. Hell I know I've gotten blasted and bitched about hippies and it isn't even relevant. What makes the film remarkable is that Joe and Bill Compton (Dennis Patrick) actually do make a formidable duo. You expect at first that Bill is putting up with Joe because of what he knows and simply humoring him. However the two seem to genuinely form a partnership, and Bill welcomes his working class "partner in crime". Joe is a refreshing change of pace from his advertising ass kissers. Bill's wife on the other hand imagines this is simply a way to humor the man to risk incrimination. 

Joe admires Bill because he killed the drug dealing sleazy boyfriend of his daughter. Joe bitches about killing hippies and making the world clean and better, Bill in his eyes has actually done it. Bill on the other hand admires Joe because he is from such a different world. A hard working man without any formal education, who's morals don't seem to far from his own. Joe of course takes things to extremes, and winds up being a horribly bad influence on Bill. A lot has been written about the end, and regardless of condemnation or praise it deeply affected me. I can't help but love Joe. He is so backward in his thinking, but damn it if I don't just want to beat the hell out of some hippies. The film has recently resurfaced in certain circles after the death of Peter Boyle, and anyone remotely interested in the actor owes it to themselves to see the film. As a side note the film was also the reported film debut of Susan Sarandon, who despite appearing throughout the credits and the first few minutes, is largely unseen throughout the rest of the picture. A remarkable film that forever seems buried amidst the better respected classics of the era.