VANISHING POINT (1971)

"Uncomfortably reminiscent of Easy Rider as an odyssey through an unknown America in its discovery of strange alliances and unpredictable hostilities" - Tom Milne

  
Best car movie ever!

"The movie opens at the climax of the film, where we are shown a roadblock of monstrous proportions, and a white 1970 Dodge Challenger rocketing toward it. From there the tale begins, backing up two days to give the rest of the story. An interstate chase is on for the driver of the Challenger, whom we know nothing at all about. As the story unfolds, the identity of the driver is rationed out in flashbacks and news reports, slowly bringing into focus the nature of the character. At first, we naturally assume the driver to be a simple car thief, as does law enforcement. Gradually, we learn that the driver is not a thief at all, he is simply delivering the car. He is a decorated Vietnam veteran who joined the police department after his honorable discharge, married a beautiful girl, and then lost her in a surfing accident. Not long after, he stopped a senior officer from beating and raping a young hippie girl, and was dishonorably discharged from the force. We also learn that his high-octane burn across the desert is to satisfy a simple wager: if he makes it from Denver to San Francisco in less than 15 hours, he doesn't have to pay for the amphetamines he bought to keep him awake for the trip. He is guided along the way by blind disc jockey "Supersoul" (Cleavon Little), who speaks to the driver (whose name is we learn is Kowalski (no last name given, via the AM radio in the Challenger. Supersoul is Kowalski's invisible guardian angel, advising him of the cop's attempts to stop him, at least until some local rednecks bust into the radio station with a storm of rocks and racial epithets and beat Super Soul and his engineer into submission.

Vanishing Point Director, Richard C Sarafian

As Kowalski rockets across the blasted desert landscape, he encounters numerous crackpots and visionaries, all of whom seem to offer another piece to the puzzle that Kowalski's life has become. From prospectors to faith healers, outlaws to newlywed hijackers, we are given a glimpse into a world that exists far from the beaten track we all travel each day. As Kowalski hurtles toward his date with the destiny that was mapped out for us at the very beginning of the film, each rumor and news report seems to contradict the image of him that is being played out by the police of several states, elevating him to something of a folk hero among a growing legion of fans and supporters.

This movie knocked me out from the very beginning. For those die-hards, yes, there are plenty of car chases and stunts to satisfy most fans of car/action films. But that's not the whole story, by any measure. For this is the story of one man, not a mythic legend, or even a regional folk hero. Why does he do what he does? He simply has nothing left to lose or gain. How many men returned from Vietnam at least a little disillusioned by the world they came home to? How many have had their lives mapped out neat and pretty, only to have the blind monkey wrench of fate turn their worlds upside down? Here is a man who is perfectly willing to sacrifice his freedom, his safety, and possibly even his life to win what amounts to a ten-dollar bet, at best. When Kowalski finally arrives at the roadblock, the inevitable conclusion to his odyssey, he takes the only road he knows, a path which had been set for him ever since the beginning.

On a cinematic level, the influence of Vanishing Point is far reaching, indeed. The story of a jaded ex-cop who has lost his wife, his hope and, to a degree, his humanity, was taken and nitro-injected in George Miller's Mad Max (1979) and the Road Warrior (1982), as Max Rockatansky (not too far a reach from Kowalski) has his life violently ripped out from under him, and thus turns to the open road. At first for revenge, but then because it is the only world he can exist in, a place where jungle law prevails. By then, Max is nothing more than a shell, a ghost of a human who haunts the blighted landscape propelled by a hunger not even he can understand. One of the most effective plot devices is that of not giving the protagonist a name until well into the film. Joel Schumaker used this technique very well in his good movie Falling Down (1993), not giving Michael Douglas' character a name until the final act of the film's story. By doing this, we are allowed to see the character as a sort of everyman, someone whom we may know, or may even be. We are then free to observe the goings-on at a much more personal level, knowing all too well that the story being played out upon the screen could, given the right circumstances, be any of us, and to that end, possibly even all of us. By the time we learn that the character is someone, it's too late. They are already a part of us, bound by destiny and experience.

Also of note is the using of a disc jockey to provide a running commentary on the nature and exploits of the protagonist (as well as provide a reasonable source for the music in the film), a device used, to lesser effect, in Walter Hill's The Warriors (1979). Lastly, although film characters have been bumping into oddballs in the desert for years, Abbe Wool's wonderful Roadside Prophets (1992) stands out as the protagonists wander through the desert, encountering numerous wisdom-dispensing desert dwellers, each contributing their ideas, ideals, and experiences in a way that lends toward a larger collective ideology wherein a greater truth resides.

This is a masterpiece of film making. Do yourself a huge favor and check it out"

December 9, 2003 Amazon Reviewer:
Michael LaPointe "Island Mike" (Hollywood, Ca United States)