No Surrender Cinema: Savage Dawn
It’s Thanksgiving week, it’s the 4th anniversary of No Surrender Cinema, and it’s time to see if I’ve picked a real turkey or something worthy of a second helping for this month’s review! While most people are hunkering down for the holidays due to pandemic precautions, NSC is hitting the open road to see how one man fares when he wages war against a psycho biker gang. It won’t be easy, but maybe, just maybe, he can survive the Savage Dawn!
Stryker (the great Lance Henriksen) arrives in the border town of Agua Dulce to catch up with his old war buddy Tick Rand (George Kennedy) to see that things are a little out of sorts. It turns out that a gang of bikers, fittingly called The Savages since this is Savage Dawn after all, have turned the town into their own personal playground full of debauchery and despicable acts. Stryker does his best to ignore the scumbags and focus instead on reconnecting with Tick and his family, which includes his daughter Katie (who has a thing for Stryker) and Danny, a teenager who is anxious to see someone kick The Savages’ asses and force them out of town for good. It just so happens that Stryker is already on the gang’s shit list, having defended the honor of a shop owner and his daughter against a few of them before arriving in town. Apparently Stryker feels that that was his good deed for the year, because for his first few days in Agua Dulce, he does nothing but stare at the bikers as they commit various heinous acts, choosing to embrace a “turn the other cheek” sense of being.
Stryker’s not the only one who has turned a blind eye to what The Savages are doing; pretty much the entire town has accepted their fate. This encourages The Savages to run amuck, defy local law enforcement, and torment the local reverend. They even wind up with groupies, like cocktail waitress Rachel (Karen Black) who offers herself up to Pigiron (William Forsythe), the leader of The Savages. When Stryker and Danny are out for a ride on Stryker’s bike and happen upon a group of Savages raping a woman, Danny wants to fight, but Stryker refuses. When Danny challenges Stryker’s pacifism, Stryker explains that there’s simply too many of The Savages for them to handle and he won’t risk anyone else’s life. It seems that the black cloud of Vietnam is still hanging over Stryker’s head, as well as Tick’s, and though Tick is already wheelchair bound, he remains in Agua Dulce as a form of penance, promising to help the townspeople once again gain access to the local gold mine. Stryker would much prefer to keep the past buried and keep on coasting through life, but when The Savages lay hands on Danny, the whole Keep Calm and Carry On thing Stryker has going for himself morphs into Keep Cool and Kick Ass!
Not only does the attack on Danny show that Stryker can only be pushed so far, it also motivates the Rand family to rally and rise up against The Savages. I suppose it helps that Tick Rand spends his days crafting military grade weaponry in his workshop, and that Katie Rand is a strong young woman who isn’t about to let these misfits walk all over her or anyone she cares about. In a film where most of the women are treated like objects by The Savages (voluntarily and against their will), the character of Katie stands out as a girl who won’t be intimidated by anybody or anything. After The Savages increase their firepower by stealing weapons from a local armory (including a tank!) and put the whole town under siege, The Rand family and some of the townsfolk mount an offensive and try to eradicate the threat of the psycho bikers once and for all. Stryker tries to reason with Tick, telling him he’s not going to take people that he loves and walk them right into certain death, but there’s only so much time for reasoning in Savage Dawn’s runtime, so you can bet on Stryker showing up for a final showdown with Pigiron and the rest of his goon squad.
Savage Dawn is a fun action film that seems to be suffering from an identity crisis. There are moments where it feels like we’re entering exploitation territory (like the roadside rape scene), and others where it comes across like an episode of The A-Team. The biker subgenre of action flicks had been overshadowed by ninja films and films featuring futuristic warfare by the time Savage Dawn was released, so it also feels a little bit like a 70’s throwback. It’s not as odd of a mixture as the subject of last month’s No Surrender Cinema was (Avenged), so I guess a fitting description would be that it feel like what Cannon Films would have done with a movie about bad bikers and a loner hero. Speaking of heroes, Henriksen’s stoic, restrained demeanor is the same trait that would enable him to play a convincing psychopath many times in his career, but here it works with him being the conflicted savior. I should also note that the blonde ‘do he’s sporting makes him look like Sting (the singer, not The Stinger) after a three day bender.
This being Bulletproof Action, the main thing that I need to point out about Savage Dawn is the action sequences. The physical fight choreography is clunky at times, though some might say it can be considered authentic; a brawl with bikers shouldn’t have thunderous punches or flashy kicks being thrown. Some of Stryker’s fistfights come off as uninspired, but the rest of the action (especially the climactic firefight) kicks things into a higher gear, such as not one but two major characters being done in by the tank in completely different fashions! Although you would think Tick’s background might lead to some major Rube Goldberg style way to dispose of The Savages in an explosive finish, it’s mainly just your standard issue Army weaponry and a healthy dose of courage that enable the citizens of Agua Dulce to take their town back once and for all.
Savage Dawn didn’t get a whole lot of love around the internet until a Blu-ray release last year by Vinegar Syndrome brought new attention onto it. Fortunately for those who have never seen it or who may remember it from years gone by, it’s currently streaming free on Tubi. If you want to spend your Thanksgiving watching George Kennedy roll around in a wheelchair firing a rocket launcher at evil bikers, or seeing Sam Kinison in a cameo as a barber who meets an unfortunate end, then this is the film for you! Although there are some slow spots within the film, something is always happening to further the plot and the action isn’t too far off. When the turkey’s gone and dessert is done, go and spend those next few hours on the couch enjoying the motorcycles and mayhem that Savage Dawn can provide you!
