Southern Comfort (1981 film)

Southern Comfort

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Walter Hill
Produced by David Giler
Written by Michael Kane
Walter Hill
David Giler
Starring Keith Carradine
Powers Boothe
Fred Ward
T. K. Carter
Franklyn Seales
Music by Ry Cooder
Cinematography Andrew Laszlo
Edited by Freeman A. Davies
Production
company
Cinema Group Ventures
Phoenix (II)
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Release dates
  • September 25, 1981
Running time
 105 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $7.6 million[1][2]
Box office 262,625 admissions (France)[3]

Southern Comfort is an American action/thriller film directed by Walter Hill and written by Michael Kane, and Hill and his longtime collaborator David Giler. It stars Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Fred Ward, T. K. Carter, Franklyn Seales, and Peter Coyote. The film, set in 1973, features a Louisiana Army National Guard squad of nine on weekend maneuvers in rural bayou country as they antagonize some local Cajun people and become hunted.

Plot

Corporal Hardin (Boothe), a cynical transfer from the Texas National Guard, is disgusted with the behavior and arrogance of his new squad. A married man, he wants no part of a date with prostitutes that Private Spencer (Carradine) has arranged for the men. Nevertheless, he is befriended by the amiable Spencer, the two seeming to agree that they are the only level-headed soldiers in the squad.

In the swamp, the patrol gets disoriented and will need to turn back unless they steal several pirogues (Cajun canoes).

The second-in-command, Sgt. Casper (Les Lannom), orders the squad to continue the "mission." The squad discovers that Cpl. Lonnie Reece (Ward) secretly brought along a box of live ammunition for hunting purposes. Caspar divides the ammo evenly amongst the squad in order to better their chances of defense. Upon reaching the shack of a one-armed French-only speaking local Cajun hunter and trapper (Brion James), Caspar orders he be placed under arrest. An emotionally unstable soldier, Cpl. "Coach" Bowden (Carlos Brown), then uses a jar filled with gasoline to burn the shack igniting the explosives inside, blowing up the house.

The soldiers begin to feel more threatened. Hearing the barking of dogs, they hope they are about to be rescued. However, the dogs belong to the Cajuns who are now hunting the soldiers because of Stuckey's actions. A dog attacks Stuckey, but Spencer and Hardin manage to frighten the dog, and it runs away. The squad begins to realize that lethal traps have been set for them. Pvt. Tyrone Cribbs (T.K. Carter) walks into one, a spear bed built into a spring released cradle frame, and is speared to death. Cribbs and Poole are buried before the squad camps for the night. In the morning, Hardin sees Reece trying to get the captured Cajun to talk by dunking his head in the swamp. The two soldiers get into a fight. The Cajun directs Hardin's attention to a nearby tree and tells him to kill Reece. Hardin takes a bayonet and stabs Reece against the tree, finally killing him. The Cajun prisoner escapes and the squad buries Reece.

The soldiers split up and search for Stuckey for a few hours, to no avail. A Cajun position is spotted, and Casper fixes his bayonet to his rifle and charges, only to be shot dead. Simms arrives on the scene and breaks down over the situation, only to be shot dead as well.

The remaining group of Spencer, Hardin and the addled Bowden (who has been disarmed and tied up) escape and camp for the night. They awaken at morning's light by a freight train and discover train tracks nearby. Bowden is hanging in a noose from the bridge. The escaped Cajun prisoner appears on the train tracks overhead. Now speaking fluent English, he warns the two remaining men to leave the Cajuns' territory while they still can, giving them directions on how to get out. He possibly spared Spencer and Hardin as they were the only two who came to his rescue when Simms slugged him and when Reece water-tortured him.

The pair leave the town and see an Army helicopter overhead and an unidentified truck coming towards them. The film ends as they see the truck bears U.S. Army markings.

Cast

Production

Hill first wrote the script in 1976.[4] At one stage it was known as The Prey.[5]

The plot of Walter Hill's earlier film, The Warriors, is based on a similar idea, that of a group of warriors who are chased by a large number of enemies through treacherous territory in order to reach their home; in that case, Coney Island. For Southern Comfort, home is English-speaking Louisiana. The literary archetype for this film can be found in the Anabasis of Xenophon. The Anabasis tells the story of the Ten Thousand, a Greek mercenary army that had fought for Cyrus the Younger in his attempt to usurp the throne of the Persian Empire from his brother, Artaxerxes II. When Cyrus died in the Battle of Cunaxa, the Greeks were forced to march through unfamiliar territory in what are now the countries of Iraq and Turkey while frequently being attacked by the people living in those regions.

According to Walter Hill he and David Giler had a deal with 20th Century Fox to "acquire and develop interesting, commercial scripts that could be produced cheaply. Alien (1979) was one of them, and Southern Comfort was another. We wanted to do a survival story, and I’d already done a film in Louisiana."[6]

They hired a writer to do a draft which Giler and Hill then rewrote. According to Hill, "No studio wanted to make it, but an independent guy showed up who had a relationship with Fox. Liked it, said he would finance it."[7]

The movie was shot in Louisiana over 55 days in the Cattle Lake Area outside Shreveport. Hill:

We were very aware that people were going to see it as a metaphor for Vietnam. The day we had the cast read, before we went into the swamps, I told everybody, 'People are going to say this is about Vietnam. They can say whatever they want, but I don’t want to hear another word about it.'"[6]

The film is supported by an atmospheric soundtrack by longstanding Hill collaborator Ry Cooder. The song "Parlez Nous à Boire," sung during the scene in the Cajun village at the end of the film, was performed by Cajun musician Dewey Balfa. The film includes many actors, including Fred Ward and Peter Coyote, who had one of their first big roles here.

Powers Boothe was cast after Hill and Giler saw him play Jim Jones in the mini series Guyana Tragedy.[8]

Hill said the concept of Keith Carradine's character "was that he was one of nature's aristocrats - graceful, confident of his own ability and able to separate himself from other people with an amusing remark", whereas the character played by Boothe "is much more the rational, hardworking, self made individual" and as a result "just cannot believe the nature of the situation at first" whereas Carradine's can.[9]

Hill later said he enjoyed the experience of making the film but that it was tough:

I was very proud of the actors in it. It was a tough movie to make, and they put up with a lot. They would probably tell you they put up with a lot from me. [Laughs.] But they really did it without complaint. And I just thought I was very fortunate to have the cast that I had. Jesus, it was a hard movie to make... I think when you see the movie you can see that this one wasn’t nightclubs in Vegas. But it was just very hard locations to get in there. Very hard to shoot. I remember so many times we’d only have a few minutes to set the camera because the bottom of the swamp would give way. And so, for your camera positions, you had to stage and shoot very quickly in many cases. It just was hard, and the weather was miserable. However, I will say this: If you choose to go make a movie in a swamp in the middle of winter, you probably deserve what you get. [Laughs.][10]

Walter Hill said the film was "not a simple action movie where the people chasing the other out there is bad":

It is clearly in a sense the kind of fault of our guys for getting into this situation. In the collective group, there are individuals who are not as highly evolved as the others. And the answers to the dilemma, I mean both nature's noblemen, those of higher character through some innate quality. And you have people that operate on a sliding scale downward to the brute level in their response to the situation that they have gotten themselves into. All of which I think is a kind of, war is terrible. It's a wartime situation. With mixed results and accompanying paranoia even by those who are the best and the brightest of the bunch... None of us are quite as good or bad as we construct them. Southern Comfort is trying not to be an easy drama.[7]

Reception

Walter Hill later said he was "always amazed" by the reception to the film. "The American reception was a real kind of nothing. But it was very nicely received around the world."[10]

He added that the movie "didn't make a fucking nickel anywhere. Foreign domestic, anything... I was proud of the film... But I was disappointed in the lack of response. It was a universal audience failure... Usually you can say they loved it in Japan or something. I don't think anybody loved it anywhere."[7]

On the rotten tomatoes website the film has received a positive reception from critics with an overall rating of 88%.[11]

See also

References

  1. ↑ THE NEW STAR PRODUCERS: THE NEW 'STAR' PRODUCERS THE NEW 'STAR' PRODUCERS Chase, Donald Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File); Mar 14, 1982; ProQuest Historical Newspapers: Los Angeles Times (1881-1990) pg. K1
  2. ↑ Solomon, Aubrey. Twentieth Century Fox: A Corporate and Financial History (The Scarecrow Filmmakers Series). Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press, 1989. ISBN 978-0-8108-4244-1. p259
  3. ↑ Box office figures for Walter Hill films in France at Box Office Story
  4. ↑ The storyteller French, Philip. The Observer (1901- 2003) [London (UK)] 01 Nov 1981: 30.
  5. ↑ At the Movies: Marthe Keller, implacable foe of typecasting. Buckley, Tom. New York Times (1923-Current file) [New York, N.Y] 05 Dec 1980: C8.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Jon Zelazny, 'Kicking Ass with Walter Hill', The Hollywood Interview, 8 Sept 2009
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 "Interview with Walter Hill Chapter 7" Directors Guild of Australia accessed 12 June 2014
  8. ↑ 'SOUTHERN COMFORT'S' COOL ONE: POWERS BOOTHE Mann, Roderick. Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) [Los Angeles, Calif] 22 Sep 1981: g1.
  9. ↑ MOVIES: Director Walter Hill: Ruggedly keeping the heroic tradition alive Kart, Larry. Chicago Tribune (1963-Current file) [Chicago, Ill] 11 Oct 1981: d11.
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 "Walter Hill on the anti-buddy movie and the evolution of the action film" By Scott Tobias AV Club Feb 1, 2013 accessed 7 July 2014
  11. ↑ http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1019482-southern_comfort/

External links