I can remember when the movie JOE came out. I was 13 at the
time and fueled by the counter culture movement that all of us in our pre-teens
and teens were involved in. We all though the clothing and choices we made were
our own and not part of some systemic norm we would be forced to take part in.
Little did everyone realize that by assuming the same clothing, same attitudes
and same quotes we were doing little more than every generation before us by
revolting against our elders. It wasn’t something new and it wasn’t something
individual. It was just something different.
JOE take those differences and adds the twist of violence to
the story. It opens with a young couple Frank (Patrick McDermott) is a drug
dealer in the seedier side of New York City. Melissa (Susan Sarandon) is a
spoiled daughter of a successful white collar couple who has fallen from Frank.
The two feed off of one another, Frank the attention he gets and Melissa the
love she thinks she has for him. After Frank gives Melissa some pills while
they’re out before heading off to sell drugs, she trips out in a drugstore
whose owner calls the EMS to take her to a hospital.
Melissa’s parents Bill (Dennis Patrick) and Joan (Audrey
Caire) show up and plan on taking her home once she’s released. Bill goes to
her apartment to pick up her things when he runs into Frank. His disdain for
Frank is on full display and Frank goads him on insulting him and his family.
In response Bill attacks him and in the process accidentally kills him. Leaving
behind a few of his drugs and taking the rest to dispose of he leaves the
building and heads to the nearest bar for a drink.
It is at the bar he chooses that he runs into Joe (Peter
Boyle). Joe is a blue collar worker and stereotypical of those at the time. He
hates taxes, his kids, blacks, foreigners and hippies equally. He talks
non-stop about all of them and how much he hates them to the chagrin of the bar
owner. When he says he wishes he could kill a hippie Bill responds with “I just
did”. Joe looks at him to see how serious he was and then the two laugh
thinking it was all a joke.
The next night Joe sees the news talking about the death of
Frank and the search for the killer. Realizing Bill was telling the truth he
calls him and wants to meet. Joe has no intention of blackmailing Bill. Instead
he thinks of them as kindred spirits, brothers in arms and a friend, something
we get the impression he has none of. The pair drink and talk and Bill loosens
up deciding he likes this breath of fresh air unlike the backstabbing suck ups
he works with in advertising.
Joe invites Bill and his wife to dinner and Bill accepts. It
goes smoothly but the man on edge at all times is Joe. He seems ready to jump
at any moment. When they finish eating he takes Bill downstairs to show him his
gun collection. He calls Joan down and attempts to calm her down and tell her
she has nothing to worry about.
But worry she will when Melissa escapes from the hospital
after finding out Frank is dead. Overhearing a conversation between her parents
when they return home from their dinner, she now knows who killed Frank and
runs away.
Joe contacts Bill to ask where he’s been to find that Bill
has been combing the streets searching for Melissa. Offering to help the pair
take to the seedier side of NYC and begin their search. Their journey through
the coffee houses and macrobiotic restaurants where they’re ridiculed by the
hippies leads them to a group that makes fun of them. Learning Bill has drugs
their attitude changes.
The unlikely group parties and gets wasted, has sex and then
part of them take off with the drugs. Joe forces one of the remaining girls to
tell them where they went and she lets them know. Guns in his trunk he and Bill
head out to find them and get back the drugs and discover what happened to
Melissa.
This may seem like a lengthy synopsis filled with potential
spoilers but not really. It provides the bare bones but not the meat that is
wrapped around them. The story itself holds your attention and the performances
on hand, especially by that of Boyle (a breakout performance it turns out) make
this movie one that holds your attention, even if he doesn’t show until 30
minutes or so in.
Made in 1970 what makes the movie even more interesting is
looking back on the story and the culture war going on at the time. The movie
depicts three separate categories of people here who all seem more alike than
different. Bill and Joan represent the white collar workers, Joe the blue
collar and Melissa and her friends the hippy generation. Where the hippies
claim individuality and independence they show none of it, all dressing alike,
using the same comments and buying products to make be part of the group. It’s
the same thing that people like Bill are hired to promote and make money from.
Looking back we can see that now and realize it better than at the time the
movie was released.
All three feel trapped in their own environments. Bill by
the boring mundane life he must work to live the lifestyle he’s chosen, Joe in
the daily grind working at the steel mill and feeling trapped by people who
have more while doing less and Melissa and her friends who work just as hard
selling drugs in order to pay for the things they want. None of the three
groups realizes they are the same as each claims only theirs is the real thing.
When the movie was released it was considered quite
controversial. It drew a lot of attention and discussion among movie goers.
Some saw Joe as a hero and others as a villain. In truth he is both. But he is
also us, the everyman out there. The movie was also a pivotal film for its
director John G. Avildsen who three years later directed the critically
acclaimed SAVE THE TIGER which won Jack Lemmon an Oscar for best actor and who
six years later directed a small film called ROCKY.
The film is being released on blu-ray by Olive Films so fans
can now have the cleanest looking copy of it they’ve ever had the chance to
own. Extras are limited to the trailer but it’s the movie itself that is worth
picking a copy of this up for. By the time the screen credits roll you’ll be
stunned, you’ll be thinking about what group you fit in and you’ll realize how
talented an actor Boyle actually was.
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