‘I got news for you. He’s nuts. I mean really fuckin’ nuts...’
The hicksploitation subgenre of horror and thriller movies typically involves a bunch of arrogant city types getting lost somewhere in rural America and then being picked off by the inbred, murderous locals. Think The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Wrong Turn or Deliverance. Southern Comfort arrived in 1981 in the midst of the golden age of hicksploitation, and it’s one of the finest examples of the genre…
Set in 1973, toward the end of the Vietnam War, the film concerns a group of nine soldiers in the Louisiana Army National Guard who embark on what should be a routine example of routine manoeuvres, but soon descends into unspeakable violence. Powers Booth, Keith Carradine and Fred Ward head up a talented cast.
Directed by cult cinema legend Walter Hill (The Warriors, 48 Hrs), Southern Comfort is more than just exploitation cinema. It becomes clear early on that the biggest obstacle and enemy to this group of nine men is themselves and the mad bureaucracy of the American military. Filming took place on location in the swamps of Louisiana, with the cast and crew complaining that they kept sinking into the mud, but this attention to detail only adds an air of authenticity to a film that was released in the ’80s but is definitely more indebted to the grimy and gritty films of the ’70s.
The descent into madness and chaos suffered by the cast here is utterly convincing, with Ward and particularly Booth both fantastic. These are characters that have been crafted from the ground up. Some real thought has gone into the creation of these men, and when they inevitably butt heads, it’s incredibly compelling. While the film loses steam somewhat in the almost silent third act, Southern Comfort is still a down-and-dirty slice of hicksploitation that deserves a more stellar reputation.
