MovieChat Forums > Rolling Thunder (1978) Discussion > Solid shootout,but violence-realistic as...

Solid shootout,but violence-realistic as hell


ROLLING THUNDER is one movie that i can watch and at the same time not to be bored by any small or big *beep* ups that most of the movies have.

RT has the right combination of character scenes and action. And since i think everyone already know about characters,i would like to say something about action in this movie.

While i think that meat grinder scene,first shootout and bar fight are typical for action movie,final shootout amazed me with level of violence and realism. O.K,if we put aside the fact that Rane and Johhny got shot few times and they are still alive (however,i read that original idea for ending was that both of them die after the shootout) what we have is qute realistic scene of clearing the location from enemies and the way that bullet and shotgun hits are filmed is exactly the way that it would be in real life situation.

This is the reason why i always mention final shootout from ROLLING THUNDER as the most realistic one i have seen. But not many people have heard for this movie,most of them the same people who think that some "one guy kills 50 guys" action movies have realistic shootouts.

Anyway,that was some info that i wanted to share.

reply

I have the novelization of the movie. The writer went off of the script and it ends with the two men both dead.

reply

Really? That's interesting. Can you tell me how different the novelization is from movie,how did they die?

reply

They both die from their wounds. Blood loss I suppose. The last chapter of the novelization looks at the aftermath - mainly the Air Force psychologist who was treating Major Rane and the girl who liked him.

reply

Thanks for this. I really liked this movie,and hearing any extra details about it is always welcomed.

I wonder did Paul Schrader's original script had downer ending. I did read that Rane and Johnny kill more innocent people then bad guys in final shootout.

reply

In Schrader's original script Rane is a war hero who was taken prisoner without firing a shot. He is a racist, runs afoul of the Mexicans and sets out on a mission of vengeance that is fueled by his racism.Ends with him going on a shooting spree. The whole thing was supposed to be an allegory about the U.S. involvement in Vietnam and how the war was racist. Ho-hum.

Heywood Gould came in and changed it substantially. Schrader said the final product was a fascist movie. What does that even mean?

Anyway I think Heywood Gould (longtime novelist as well as scriptwriter "Fort Apache. The Bronx", "The Boys from Brazil","Cocktail" and sometime director "One Good Cop". He has a page here at imdb) wrote a better movie. Instead of just another movie about an "evil" Vietnam veteran who is really a racist, coward and a fake. Way too political.

But that's just my take on it. I've never been very PC.

reply

I really thought that they would die. Both were miserable since they came back from POW camp. Devane with good reason, said he was dead inside.
Tommy Lee couldn't wait to get out of his house! Good grief, 7 years and come back to that! It wasn't living with a woman that was the problem.
If they lived, perhaps they were ready to join life again.

reply

The ending sure leaves room for a viewer to decide their fate, but they both were in really bad shape after that shooting. Both of them had taken hits in vital areas, so chanches of them surviving didn't seem very high.

Anyhow a really good film that sent a powerfull message about what it felt to return from Vietnam after many years in a prison camp. Even though main characters returned home, they were both kind of broken inside.

reply

Throughout the entire movie, Rane and Johnny react to pain with complete apathy. It's reasonable to assume that, even if they were gonna die from blood-loss, sepsis, or whatever, they would simply stand up and walk away.

reply