Harvey Hart's SHOOT is easily as paranoid a 1970s movie to come out of the paranoid 70s as I have ever seen, other than perhaps Hart's own 1973 urban Gothic horror nightmare THE PYX -- a film which left me feeling uneasy for days. He is good at it. This one is more of an intriguing idea run amok, supposedly based on a novel of about the same name that I will simply have to seek out after finally managing to "get" the movie.
The situations under which I first encountered it played a part in why it failed to impress upon the first sitting; I chose this as a party night movie, expecting another OPEN SEASON or RITUALS or even WOLF LAKE, three other films which deal with war veterans encountering human barbarity in the great outdoors that are raucous fun by comparison. SHOOT even gives an important supporting role to Henry Silva -- "Mr. Ice" -- one of my favorite actors to have graduated from the Italian genre film era where he headlined in a number of amusingly amoral & gory crime thrillers.
SHOOT however, in spite of its subject matter of beer swilling humans hunting other humans for kicks out in the woods, is about as close to a thoughtful drama as I have allowed on my TV set since Paul Schrader's equally paranoid ROLLING THUNDER. Where that film explored America's painful post-Vietnam hangover in starkly arid rural themes, SHOOT is a Canadian tax shelter film that likewise explores another hangover from the scourges of war out in the chilly sticks of Ontario. Specifically the scars left on Cliff Robertson's Major Rex, a decorated Canadian war hero who secretly yearns to do it all over again. All he needs is an excuse to play army man again for real, and the story is about his apparent glee at having one handed to him.
If nothing else, SHOOT is a sort of cinematic proof that men go deer hunting because they can't hunt each other anymore. The core premise of the film has two hunting parties encountering each other on a hum-drum day with no game in sight. For reasons that the film wisely never bothers to explain they start shooting at each other and someone gets their brains blown out. I say wisely because to try and put a motivation to the first shot is pointless: They were guys with guns out looking to for things to shoot at with them, and when humans get together in groups under such situations things often happen that have no rational explanation. The guy opened fire because that's what a gun is for, the other group fired back to defend themselves, and Henry Silva aces the bozo right between the eyes from about 175 yards without thinking twice about it. So far so good. That's what Henry Silva is usually in a movie for.
The film then shifts gears and becomes about the paranoia that develops within the group as they debate what to do about it, hence the tagline about how SHOOT takes up where DELIVERANCE ends. But its more than that as the communal paranoia apparently pushes Robertson's over-the-top Major Rex right over the line into active psychosis. He seems to think he's General Patton at one point in the film's most bizarre scene where he calls his war council of aging buddies together. His solution is to muster "volunteers" from the local militia group he commands, arm them with automatic weapons in full combat garb with steel helmets, and go back to the site of the incident to engage in a private little war with the other group, provided of course the other guys show up likewise armed for a fully pitched battle. They do.
The final 10 minutes of the film pack as much mayhem and violence into it as your standard Department of Defense documentary on The Battle of Iwo Jima as the two forces tear into each other with a ferocity that is totally out of proportion to anything that the film hinted at up until then. Absolute mayhem. If Robertson's closing monologue is to be believed his entire 20 man assault force is annihilated in the bloodbath, raising the curious question of how local Canadian authorities might have reacted to such a body count. Though within the context of the film it was the only ending possible. War is hell, and without an actual war men will cheerfully create their own hells to fill the vacuum.
So I say SHOOT is actually about Major Rex' spiral into functional insanity and the close bond between his hunting buddies that drags them down the toilet with him. It certainly isn't a fun movie but does have a kind of visual authority to it that is quite authentic. The outdoor sequences are well staged and the final shootout on a snow strewn woodland scene is something right out of Korea. The interior of the men's homes, bedecked with weapons of war as decorative pieces, is also something striking. It's about as un-romantic a depiction as possible, showing us warriors displaced in a society that seems to feed their paranoia without thinking twice about it
They aren't even the heroes of the movie, just its protagonists. Like THE PYX there aren't any genuinely sympathetic characters in the cast aside from Ernst Borgnine's reluctant war buddy who doesn't know if this is all such a good idea. It isn't a particularly fun movie but was very well made on somewhat limited resources and makes for thoughtful viewing once you get beyond its deliberately methodical pace. Just don't be fooled by pictures of Henry Silva packing a Swedish K sub machine gun into thinking it's going to be a laugh riot like I was. It's not that kind of a movie at all, and faulting it for being what it is rather than what it's not misses the point.
7/10
The situations under which I first encountered it played a part in why it failed to impress upon the first sitting; I chose this as a party night movie, expecting another OPEN SEASON or RITUALS or even WOLF LAKE, three other films which deal with war veterans encountering human barbarity in the great outdoors that are raucous fun by comparison. SHOOT even gives an important supporting role to Henry Silva -- "Mr. Ice" -- one of my favorite actors to have graduated from the Italian genre film era where he headlined in a number of amusingly amoral & gory crime thrillers.
SHOOT however, in spite of its subject matter of beer swilling humans hunting other humans for kicks out in the woods, is about as close to a thoughtful drama as I have allowed on my TV set since Paul Schrader's equally paranoid ROLLING THUNDER. Where that film explored America's painful post-Vietnam hangover in starkly arid rural themes, SHOOT is a Canadian tax shelter film that likewise explores another hangover from the scourges of war out in the chilly sticks of Ontario. Specifically the scars left on Cliff Robertson's Major Rex, a decorated Canadian war hero who secretly yearns to do it all over again. All he needs is an excuse to play army man again for real, and the story is about his apparent glee at having one handed to him.
If nothing else, SHOOT is a sort of cinematic proof that men go deer hunting because they can't hunt each other anymore. The core premise of the film has two hunting parties encountering each other on a hum-drum day with no game in sight. For reasons that the film wisely never bothers to explain they start shooting at each other and someone gets their brains blown out. I say wisely because to try and put a motivation to the first shot is pointless: They were guys with guns out looking to for things to shoot at with them, and when humans get together in groups under such situations things often happen that have no rational explanation. The guy opened fire because that's what a gun is for, the other group fired back to defend themselves, and Henry Silva aces the bozo right between the eyes from about 175 yards without thinking twice about it. So far so good. That's what Henry Silva is usually in a movie for.
The film then shifts gears and becomes about the paranoia that develops within the group as they debate what to do about it, hence the tagline about how SHOOT takes up where DELIVERANCE ends. But its more than that as the communal paranoia apparently pushes Robertson's over-the-top Major Rex right over the line into active psychosis. He seems to think he's General Patton at one point in the film's most bizarre scene where he calls his war council of aging buddies together. His solution is to muster "volunteers" from the local militia group he commands, arm them with automatic weapons in full combat garb with steel helmets, and go back to the site of the incident to engage in a private little war with the other group, provided of course the other guys show up likewise armed for a fully pitched battle. They do.
The final 10 minutes of the film pack as much mayhem and violence into it as your standard Department of Defense documentary on The Battle of Iwo Jima as the two forces tear into each other with a ferocity that is totally out of proportion to anything that the film hinted at up until then. Absolute mayhem. If Robertson's closing monologue is to be believed his entire 20 man assault force is annihilated in the bloodbath, raising the curious question of how local Canadian authorities might have reacted to such a body count. Though within the context of the film it was the only ending possible. War is hell, and without an actual war men will cheerfully create their own hells to fill the vacuum.
So I say SHOOT is actually about Major Rex' spiral into functional insanity and the close bond between his hunting buddies that drags them down the toilet with him. It certainly isn't a fun movie but does have a kind of visual authority to it that is quite authentic. The outdoor sequences are well staged and the final shootout on a snow strewn woodland scene is something right out of Korea. The interior of the men's homes, bedecked with weapons of war as decorative pieces, is also something striking. It's about as un-romantic a depiction as possible, showing us warriors displaced in a society that seems to feed their paranoia without thinking twice about it
They aren't even the heroes of the movie, just its protagonists. Like THE PYX there aren't any genuinely sympathetic characters in the cast aside from Ernst Borgnine's reluctant war buddy who doesn't know if this is all such a good idea. It isn't a particularly fun movie but was very well made on somewhat limited resources and makes for thoughtful viewing once you get beyond its deliberately methodical pace. Just don't be fooled by pictures of Henry Silva packing a Swedish K sub machine gun into thinking it's going to be a laugh riot like I was. It's not that kind of a movie at all, and faulting it for being what it is rather than what it's not misses the point.
7/10