**SPOILERS*** The first of the Billy Jack quartet of movies that's the least sanctimonious and preachy of the bunch and the only one that doesn't have the name "Billy Jack" in it's title.
Mr. Jack, Tom Laughlin,were given to understand in the films prologue has called it quits on society after coming home from "Nam", South Viet Nam, with a chest full of medals as a member of the elite and tough as nails Green Berets. Mr.Jack, or Billy Jack, has since become a recluse minding his own business and living with nature, in his trailer, outside the seaside town of Big Rock California where he occasionally drives in with his jeep to get both food and supplies.
One afternoon Billy Jack goes out of his way saving the life of a motorist who's being attacked and beaten by this gang of bikers known as the Born Losers,or Born to Lose. This ends up not only educating Billy Jack on what the outside world, beyond his home in the woods, is all about but makes him become an activist for among other things womens rights and the rights of self-defense.
Billy ending up fined $1,000.00, bankrupting him, and sentenced to 120 days in jail, that the judge dismissed, is outraged that the bikers who almost beat a man, the motorist that Billy saved, to death were given a much lighter sentence. Billy used a rifle, which according to the law is illegal, to save the man's life and the bikers used their fists as well as steel pipes and wooden clubs, which according the law is legal, to beat him into a pulp!
This incident at the beginning of the film "The Born Losers" sets the stage for the now arrogant and filled with hubris bikers going on a raping rampage grabbing a number of teenager, who in fact were invited over to their clubhouse, and brutally gang raping them. Among the bikers rape victims is also Vicky Barrington, Elizabeth James, who was just riding through town on her motorcycle with nothing but a florescent white bikini on. Vicky caught the eye of the bikers lead by the insect-looking, with those oddly-shaped black and white goggles on, Danny Carmody played by Jeremy Slate who just went wild over her. Looking like mousy Shelley Duvall from the neck up and voluptuously sexy Jacqueline Bissett from the neck down Vicky had that right combination of innocence and guilt, in the way she was flirting with the sex crazed bikers, that the bikers felt that she was asking for it and, despite her fending them off, piled on top of her.
The local sheriff and D.A, Stuart Lancaster & Paul Bruce, were trying to make a case against the bikers but their victims, about a half dozen young women including Vicky, were just too scared to testify against them which in effect tied theirs as well as the laws' hands. It was the bikers intimidation of the witnesses that really brought the best, or worst, out of Billy Jack in him doing what the gutless sheriff and his deputies were afraid to do, take the law into his own hands. Going from cold to hot an back again the violence avoiding and pacifistic Billy Jack purposely lets the bikers push him around so far that his adherence to violence, that he developed since he left the horrors of the Viet Nam War behind him, was slowly stripped away as he turned into the mad as hell, with his fists feet and guns, individual that he tried to repress for so long.
Not just your typical biker movie "The Born Losers" in its own and amateurish way tries to tell it's audience how the law ties the hands of honest citizens by forcing them to give up their arms as well as refraining from defending themselves with anything, besides firearms, available to them. The police in the film are totally ineffective in enforcing the law in not just arresting the criminals, the bikers, and bringing them to justice but they can't even protect their victims who are needed to testify against them in court.
Billy Jack who in the end saves the day, after having his skull cracked open, by putting an end to the bikers reign of terror in the little town of Big Rock ends up almost getting killed himself by the police whom he called to come to his rescue. Billy racing on a motorcycle to the hospital to see how Vicky, who was almost beaten to death by the bikers, is doing ends up being shot in the back by an overly eager sheriff's deputy who thinks he's one of the criminal bikers trying to make a run for it! Despite all it's flaw's "The Born Losers" is by far the best of the four Blly Jack movies. This was only because the movie was made before it's star writer and director Tom Laughlin got too philosophical and sermonizing,in his screenplays, due to the amazing financial success of the Billy Jack films, which gave Laughlin complete control in making them, that followed it.
"The Born Losers" at least stuck to a simple story that could easily be followed by those watching it. This made it a much better film then the three later Billy Jack movies that besides their confusingly mystic and American Indian philosophy themes also had so many sub-plots, which "The Born Losers" didn't, that you got lost watching them long before they were finally over.
Mr. Jack, Tom Laughlin,were given to understand in the films prologue has called it quits on society after coming home from "Nam", South Viet Nam, with a chest full of medals as a member of the elite and tough as nails Green Berets. Mr.Jack, or Billy Jack, has since become a recluse minding his own business and living with nature, in his trailer, outside the seaside town of Big Rock California where he occasionally drives in with his jeep to get both food and supplies.
One afternoon Billy Jack goes out of his way saving the life of a motorist who's being attacked and beaten by this gang of bikers known as the Born Losers,or Born to Lose. This ends up not only educating Billy Jack on what the outside world, beyond his home in the woods, is all about but makes him become an activist for among other things womens rights and the rights of self-defense.
Billy ending up fined $1,000.00, bankrupting him, and sentenced to 120 days in jail, that the judge dismissed, is outraged that the bikers who almost beat a man, the motorist that Billy saved, to death were given a much lighter sentence. Billy used a rifle, which according to the law is illegal, to save the man's life and the bikers used their fists as well as steel pipes and wooden clubs, which according the law is legal, to beat him into a pulp!
This incident at the beginning of the film "The Born Losers" sets the stage for the now arrogant and filled with hubris bikers going on a raping rampage grabbing a number of teenager, who in fact were invited over to their clubhouse, and brutally gang raping them. Among the bikers rape victims is also Vicky Barrington, Elizabeth James, who was just riding through town on her motorcycle with nothing but a florescent white bikini on. Vicky caught the eye of the bikers lead by the insect-looking, with those oddly-shaped black and white goggles on, Danny Carmody played by Jeremy Slate who just went wild over her. Looking like mousy Shelley Duvall from the neck up and voluptuously sexy Jacqueline Bissett from the neck down Vicky had that right combination of innocence and guilt, in the way she was flirting with the sex crazed bikers, that the bikers felt that she was asking for it and, despite her fending them off, piled on top of her.
The local sheriff and D.A, Stuart Lancaster & Paul Bruce, were trying to make a case against the bikers but their victims, about a half dozen young women including Vicky, were just too scared to testify against them which in effect tied theirs as well as the laws' hands. It was the bikers intimidation of the witnesses that really brought the best, or worst, out of Billy Jack in him doing what the gutless sheriff and his deputies were afraid to do, take the law into his own hands. Going from cold to hot an back again the violence avoiding and pacifistic Billy Jack purposely lets the bikers push him around so far that his adherence to violence, that he developed since he left the horrors of the Viet Nam War behind him, was slowly stripped away as he turned into the mad as hell, with his fists feet and guns, individual that he tried to repress for so long.
Not just your typical biker movie "The Born Losers" in its own and amateurish way tries to tell it's audience how the law ties the hands of honest citizens by forcing them to give up their arms as well as refraining from defending themselves with anything, besides firearms, available to them. The police in the film are totally ineffective in enforcing the law in not just arresting the criminals, the bikers, and bringing them to justice but they can't even protect their victims who are needed to testify against them in court.
Billy Jack who in the end saves the day, after having his skull cracked open, by putting an end to the bikers reign of terror in the little town of Big Rock ends up almost getting killed himself by the police whom he called to come to his rescue. Billy racing on a motorcycle to the hospital to see how Vicky, who was almost beaten to death by the bikers, is doing ends up being shot in the back by an overly eager sheriff's deputy who thinks he's one of the criminal bikers trying to make a run for it! Despite all it's flaw's "The Born Losers" is by far the best of the four Blly Jack movies. This was only because the movie was made before it's star writer and director Tom Laughlin got too philosophical and sermonizing,in his screenplays, due to the amazing financial success of the Billy Jack films, which gave Laughlin complete control in making them, that followed it.
"The Born Losers" at least stuck to a simple story that could easily be followed by those watching it. This made it a much better film then the three later Billy Jack movies that besides their confusingly mystic and American Indian philosophy themes also had so many sub-plots, which "The Born Losers" didn't, that you got lost watching them long before they were finally over.