Joe
Hardhats and hippies clash in 1960s New York City in this gritty drama exploring the rocky edge of that era's generation gap. With Academy Award®-winner Susan Sarandon in her screen debut and starring Peter Boyle in a "stunningly effective" (Variety) performance, Joe is a "powerful" (The Wall Street Journal), "immensely sophisticated piece of filmmaking" (Los Angeles Times) about an era in turmoil.
Joe Curran (Boyle) is a loudmouthed factory worker with a bigot's mean streak. Bill Compton (Dennis Patrick) is a wealthy executive who, in an uncharacteristic fit of rage, has just murdered the drug-addicted boyfriend of his daughter (Sarandon). When the two men meet in a bar, an unholy alliance is formed. And after Bill's daughter runs away, they search for her in the psychedelic underworld they despise... setting in motion a shocking and humiliating string of events that leads to a brutal and chilling final scene.
Member Reviews
The death of the 60s - RobBC
A proper white collar executive comes face to face with his darker half in the form of a slovenly loudmouthed bigot in this rather heavy-handed look at the backside of the American dream. Boyle manages to portray the titular cretin with venomous abandon despite a script rife with oversimplified stereotypes (think of Archie Bunker with rabies) while the rest of the cast put in adequate performances especially Audrey Caire as the executive's class-conscious trophy wife. With its overbearing use of symbolism and occasional vitriolic rants, "Joe" is about as subtle as a baseball bat to the kidneys......but it provides an interesting example of how Hollywood interpreted the death of the 60s. Worth a look.An incendiary portrait of its time - RocketScience
Like many other satires of the dangers of intolerance, xenophobia, and the alchemy of impotence into violence, Joe was commonly misinterpreted as an attack on the perceived free morality of the 60's. However, the story hinges on the clash of cultures on 3 fronts: Dennis Patrick's rich, Cadillac-driving businessman, Peter Boyle's frustrated blue-collar racist, and the emerging culture of youth and 'foreign' ideals that confuses them both. No side comes across in a flattering manner in this conflict, and all are painted with broad strokes, often laughably.
Joe was apparently hugely popular as an expression of the deep-rooted worry felt by so much of middle America at the time - that the reins of the country (and its culture) were passing from the white patriarchy into other, more chaotic hands. Almost 40 years later the fear of this seems unfounded, but the war of values is still very much alive, and Joe's personal worldview seems not far removed from many in power today.
Despite some key plot twists that beggar belief, (Dennis Patrick gaining entrance to a hippie party by posing as a dealer is exceptionally bizarre) the story is really engaging, and could be considered to have inspired many other films (Michael Douglas seems to have taken a kick at both the lead roles, in Traffic and Falling Down, respectively.) It would be interesting to see a remake, perhaps with Anarchist activist types filling in for the Hippies of the original.
It's not a great film, but a strangely overlooked one - important both as a distorted portrait of its time as a reflection of our own.
Member Reviews
Read All...
The death of the 60s - RobBC
A proper white collar executive comes face to face with his darker half in the form of a slovenly loudmouthed bigot in this rather heavy-handed look at the backside of the American dream. Boyle manages to portray the titular cretin with venomous abandon despite ...An incendiary portrait of its time - RocketScience
Like many other satires of the dangers of intolerance, xenophobia, and the alchemy of impotence into violence, Joe was commonly misinterpreted as an attack on the perceived free morality of the 60's. However, the story hinges on the clash of cultures on 3 ...