CLAY PIGEON
US, 1971, 93 minutes, Colour.
Tom Stern, Telly Savalas, Robert Vaughn, John Marley, Burgess Meredith, Ivan Dixon, Jeff Corey, Marilyn Akin, Peter Lawford.
Directed by Lane Slate, Tom Stern.
Clay Pigeon is an action thriller of the early 1970s in the vein of Billy Jack. It is a star vehicle for Tom Stern who acted as director (his only film). Stern had appeared in a number of action films as well as bikie films of the period.
The plot concerns a former soldier recruited by the FBI to go under cover in Los Angeles. Former soldiers are now part of a drug-dealing gang.
The film is predictable in its presentation of its hero, the action, the role of the police. However, it has a very strong cast of character actors.
1. An enjoyable thriller? A picture of America in the sixties and seventies? Impact now? Qualities as a thriller?
2. The significance of the title, victim, shooting? Violent sport? The reference to Joe and its application? The importance of the device and the time-lapse situation with his falling on the grenade? A moment of death?
3. Joe as a typical American hero? His being a man of his time, his police background, the experience in Vietnam and the effect on him? His leaving an American world, experiencing Vietnam and returning? His attitude to the world he discovered? As symbolized by Saddle and her drug addiction, Tracy? His attitude towards this world? The film's critique of America?
4. The significance of his rest and the slight cause? Frank Redford and his role in the police? Attitudes towards Joe? The decision to use him and the way that he used him? What right had he? Authoritarian?
5. The film's presentation and critique of Neilson, wealth, the world of drugs, thugs? The ugly violence and Neilsen's henchmen? How interesting and accurate a portrait of ugly Americans?
6. The ugliness of the police in comparison with that of the drugs and the gangsters?
7. The importance and contribution of the incidental characters: the police, Freedom Lovelace and his being bashed? Angeline?
8. The portrait of Saddle , Tracy, the fact that those were people who were victims and died?
9. How justified was Joe's anger against Neilson, against Redford, his fighting of Redford?
10. His reaction to the violence, to deaths? The moment of his own death and its significance? Our journey through his experience to the moment of his death?
11. A competent thriller, action sequences, the ugliness of America? Critique, of society, individuals within society?
