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Sep 21, 2015 Web Exclusive By Austin Trunick

A booming oil industry turns the modest Californian town of Elk Hills into lawless bedlam. The community is overrun by outside oil workers looking to spend their newly-earned money on booze, gambling, and in the local brothels—massive brawls are commonplace, public property is rampantly destroyed, and cops are shot willy-nilly. The disorder is too much for the town’s overwhelmed law enforcement to handle, so they ask local golden boy Ben Arnold (Jan-Michael Vincent) to bring his brother in to help them clean up the mess. Aaron Arnold (Kris Kristofferson) deputizes a gang of his fellow Vietnam veterans, but turns out to be more trouble for the people of Elk Hills than the ruffians he was brought in to stomp out.

Released in 1976, Vigilante Force is a highly entertaining action flick; the fact that it’s frequently far-fetched and rather predictable doesn’t take away from its enjoyability. As evidenced in the candid commentary provided by director George Armitage (Grosse Point Blank), the filmmakers and cast were fully aware they were making something a little bit silly with this Gene Corman-produced drive-in film. (Imagine Road House, but on a smaller budget and more country-fried.) Kristofferson brings a lot of down-home charisma to the film, and it helps that he’s surround by good character actors. (The Jerk’s Bernadette Peters is a lot of fun as Arnold’s prostitute girlfriend-turned-lounge singer, Little Dee.) The movie’s lengthy final shootout is legitimately exciting, and makes it quite clear that a significant portion of the movie’s budget had to have been spent on explosive and pyrotechnic effects. (There’s a lot of fantastic stunt work to be found, as well.)

Kino’s Blu-ray transfer looks very good. The aforementioned commentary is the disc’s central bonus feature, but Armitage is quite honest about the film and entertaining; he offers some nice insight into just how these fun, modestly-budgeted action movies were made during that era. There are also trailers for this film, Defiance, and Sam Peckinpah’s Convoy, which Kristofferson went on to star in two years later and was released on Blu-ray by Kino earlier this year.

www.kinolorber.com/video.php?id=2104

Author rating: 6/10