A revenge-themed grindhouse item from 1977 that appears to have had Important Cinema aspirations. That’s evident in THE FARMER’S trailer, which references FIVE EASY PIECES, EASY RIDER and TAXI DRIVER, “important and deeply personal films (that) each told the story of people looking for their own piece of the American Dream,” and apparently “THE FARMER is a motion picture in this special tradition.” Not quite.
The project, initially intended as a vehicle for Clint Eastwood, ended up in the hands of the veteran screen (big and small) performer Gary Conway. Hoping to elevate his moribund career, Conway produced and got his father John Carmody to rewrite the $975,000 budgeted film, which was acquired two years after its 1975 completion by Columbia Pictures. Its release was not unsuccessful, with the film playing the drive-in circuit continuously for a year, only to get “lost” for over four decades. It wasn’t until early 2022, when a Blu-ray edition was released by Scorpion Releasing (following a poor quality dub leaked online in late ‘21), that THE FARMER became available once again—and reminded us that oftentimes there’s a reason movies are “lost.”
The film’s pretensions are announced in the opening scene, a montage of newsreel footage showing the horrors of WWII. Following this we’re introduced to Kyle Martin (Conway), a taciturn veteran of that war who favors black shades and a leather jacket, and wants nothing more than to man a rural farm. First, though, he proves his virtue on a train, where he defends a black soldier from white racists.
Kyle is in debt, and his farm is about to be foreclosed upon. One night he rescues a degenerate gambler named Johnny O’ (Michael Dante) from a burning car that crashes near the farm, and is rewarded with $15,000. This isn’t enough for Kyle to pay off the bank and save his farm, but then another money-making opportunity presents itself when Johnny is blinded by some gangsters he stiffed, and summons Kyle to track down and kill the scumbags. The summoning is done by Johnny’s hot GF Betty (Angel Thompkins), who becomes Kyle’s designated love interest.
Regarding Johnny’s offer, Kyle is initially skeptical but has a change of heart after the gangsters rape Betty and burn down Kyle’s horse stable. From there bloodshed reigns as Kyle stalks the bad guys through a city, the gangsters target the hospitalized Johnny and a hit is put out on Betty.
THE FARMER was the first and only film directed by longtime editor David Berlatsky (whose credits include THE LAST MOVIE, PAT GARRETT AND BILLY THE KID and THE DEEP), which explains its uncertain visuals, poorly utilized music cues (although the propulsive score, by the veteran composer Hugo Montenegro, is fairly strong on its own) and lazy eye for historical detail. Setting the film in the 1940s was a mistake, as its story was quite relevant to the Vietnam era, and the period overlay feels gratuitous—a symptom of a B-movie that, again, wanted very much to be an A project. The film is also, quite shockingly given Berlatsky’s profession, poorly edited, with much repetitious footage of people getting out of cars and crossing streets, and fight scenes that are rarely coherent.
Nor is Berlatsky’s work with actors particularly noteworthy. Gary Conway has an appropriately gruff, world-weary screen presence that recalls the intended star Clint Eastwood, and trash movie legend Angel Tompkins (PRIME CUT, LITTLE CIGARS, THE TEACHER, ALLIGATOR, etc.) elevates, slightly, the role of Betty above the throwaway love interest provided by the screenwriters. The rest of the cast, however, doesn’t rise to the occasion, with one of them, the late George Memmoli (MEAN STREETS, THE PHANTOM OF THE PARADISE, ROCKY, etc.), having been severely injured in one of the film’s stunts, which lost him a plumb role in TAXI DRIVER (a role that film’s director Martin Scorsese ended up playing himself).
Where the film really comes alive is in the final killing spree, which is strong and graphic (albeit undercut somewhat by the clichéd weapons training montage that proceeds it, which plays like a bad parody of a similar scene in TAXI DRIVER). That, alas, occurs in the final 20 minutes, and is not enough to make up for what came before.
Vital Statistics
THE FARMER
Columbia Pictures
Director: David Berlatsky
Producer: Gary Conway
Screenplay: Janice Colson-Dodge, John Carmody, Patrick Regan, George Fargo
Cinematography: Irv Goodnoff
Editing: Richard Weber
Cast: Gary Conway, Angel Tompkins, Michael Dante, George Memmoli, Timothy Scott, Timothy Scott, Jack Waltzer, Ken Renard, Johnny Popwell, Stratton Leopold, Sonny Shroyer, Eric Weston, Don Payne, Bill Moses, Laura Whyte, Roy Tatum