Reviled by its initial audience but now heralded by modern directors like Robert Rodriguez, Rolling Thunder is the kind of movie that could’ve only been made in the ’70s. Charles Rane (William Devane) is a traumatized Vietnam vet back home from a hellish POW experience, an emotionally cold shell of his former self. Unable to connect with anyone, including his own family, Rane introverts and slips back into the daily regimen of his former captivity. Until, that is, a group of thugs take him and his family hostage, rob them blind, and leave them for dead. Rand finally snaps and sets down a gritty path of vengeance that’ll leave no one unscathed. Dark, mildly exploitative, and containing disturbing violence, the film’s power ultimately derives from Devane’s stirring performance alongside a then-unknown Tommy Lee Jones and the pitch-perfect tone of the movie in relation to the story. Catch it on 35mm at Harvard Film Archive.

Rolling Thunder
1977
dir. John Flynn
99 min