The Born Losers

Plot synopsis:
Billy Jack is introduced as an enigmatic, half-Indian Vietnam War veteran who shuns society, taking refuge in the peaceful solitude of the California Central Coast mountains. His troubles begin when he descends from this unspoiled setting and drives into a small beach town named Big Rock (Morro Bay). A minor traffic accident in which a motorist hits a motorcyclist results in a savage beating by members of the Born Losers Motorcycle Club. The horrified bystanders (including Laughlin's wife, Delores Taylor, and their two children in cameo roles) are too afraid to help or be involved in any way. Billy Jack jumps into the fray and rescues the man by himself. At this point the police arrive and arrest Billy for using a rifle to stop the fight. (The irony here is that, unknown to Billy, the motorist is the one who starts the fight by inexplicably insulting one of the bikers.)
The police throw Billy in jail and the judge fines him heavily for discharging a rifle in public. He is treated with suspicion and hostility by the police. Meanwhile, the marauding bikers terrorize the town, rape four teenage girls (Jane Russell plays the mother of one of the girls), and threaten anyone slated to testify against them. One of the girls, played by Susan Foster, later recants, saying she willingly gave herself to the biker gang. (Foster would go on to play a larger supporting role in Billy Jack.)
Co-scriptwriter Elizabeth James plays Vicky Barrington, a bikini-clad damsel-in-distress who is twice abducted and abused by the gang. The second time, she and Billy are kidnapped together. After Billy is brutally beaten, Vicky agrees to become the gang's sexually compliant "biker mama" if they release Billy. At the police station, Billy is unable to get help from the police or the local residents and must return to the gang's lair to rescue Vicky by himself.
Billy, armed with a Springfield rifle, captures the gang, shoots the leader (Jeremy Slate) between the eyes, and forces some of the others to take Vicky, who's been badly beaten, to the hospital. As the police finally arrive, Billy abruptly rides away on one of the gang's motorcycles.
The anti-authority sentiment continues up to the end when a police deputy accidentally shoots Billy in the back, mistaking him for a fleeing gang member. He is later found, nearly dead, lying by the shore of a lake. He is placed on a stretcher and is flown to the hospital in a helicopter as Vicky and the sheriff give him a salute.

Tags: cult, violence

Review:
But they don't have a champion like Tom Laughlin (in his first appearance as Billy Jack) who manages to get Vicky out of danger (at least for a while) and subsequently falls in love with her.
"Born Losers" has a great score by "Wild Angels" composer (and future Lieutenant Governor of California) Mike Curb, good acting by a large cast, and a fine cameo appearance by Jane Russell as the trashy mother of one of the victimized girls.
While most people are familiar with Tom Laughlin's half Native American/half Anglo cult figure Billy Jack through THE LEGEND OF BILLY JACK, many don't know that the character originally appeared in this flick, an off-kilter biker flick about a group of psycho cyclists who terrorize a small California town over Spring Break and zero in on a young college co-ed whom they raped and don't want to testify against them.
Still, if you want to catch a glimpse of Billy Jack's debut or like to study sixties film styles, take a look at this one.
And for the era in which the film was made, there was no better hero than the charismatic loner, half-breed Billy Jack, played with serene gusto by Tom Laughlin.
The film makes the point that bad parenting and ineptness in traditional law enforcement foster an environment conducive to delinquency.Interestingly, although this is the first Billy Jack film, Laughlin played a similar role ten years earlier, in a movie called "The Delinquents" (1957).
Tom Laughlin's 1967 film The Born Losers is not what it appears to be; good-guy defeats out-law biker gang and saves young rape victims.
After the amazing success of Billy Jack, it was re-released and showed a pretty-profit.A strong supporting cast of "B" movie legends-Elizabeth James, Jerome Slate, Robert Tessier, Jack Starrett along with a "faded" Jane Russell, make Born Losers one of the more outstanding independent movies of the 1960s.Born Losers is a Born Winner..
Sprinkle in ten minutes of Billy kicking big donkey, and you have the formula.Tom Laughlin knew a winner when he saw one and would use the main elements of this film in all of his future Billy Jack movies.
Loner Billy Jack (Tom Laughlin), just returned from Viet Nam, pits himself against a vicious motorcycle gang who are terrorizing a California town, protecting a rape victim and standing alone when even the police are reluctant to act.This is one of the best of its kind.
In-your-face violence for its time, only a little martial-arts action (compared to the later BJ films) but all the ingredients are on hand for a character who is destined to become an American screen icon.The nattering nabobs can kavetch about bad acting until their faces turn blue---Billy Jack is what he is, and Laughlin plays him to perfection.
Tessier, a military vet and stunt man, was also the stunt adviser for the film.Classic hero defending his girl against despicable bad guys makes for ONE TERRIFIC MOVIE.
I can only imagine the reactions when they discovered their favorite movie channel was showing 2 hours of mayhem, featuring brutal violence and gang rapes as a motorcycle gang, "The Born Losers" terrorize a California town in this 1967 classic of the biker flick genre.
However, the most compelling character in BL isn't Tom Laughlin as Billy Jack, but screen veteran Jeremy Slate as Danny Carmody, the leader of the biker gang.
Slate actually brings a touch of humor (like wearing goofy white sunglasses that look like they were ripped off an old lady) to an otherwise repulsive thug and in my book does a superior of more believable job of playing a biker gang boss than Brando did in "The Wild One." Also notable is the great Jane Russell, in a small part as a washed out alcoholic mom of a girl who fell in the bikers.
For some reason, I remember this as being the target of jokes and sneers when it was new.Making sure to avoid prejudice, wanting to see it myself and know for sure, I recorded it when it premiered on Turner Classic Movies so I could watch in the right mood.What a pleasant surprise it turned out to be.To the best of my weakening memory, I don't believe I've ever seen Tom Laughlin and now I wonder why.First, he was a really good-looking guy, and he was a very pleasant personality on screen.
(2008, second viewing) p.s. the movie isn't going to appeal to everyone, but it's coming from a good place compared to a lot of exploitation films.
For example this time around I noticed that the film can be seen as an anti-Western -- as opposed to the stereotypical concept of a white man rescuing the white virgins from the "indians", here we have an ostensibly Native American hero rescuing the white women from white bikers (bikes and jeeps standing in for horses and stagecoaches in the traditional Western iconography of course)..
Even though the acting wasn't all that much better in the other Billy Jack movies, they at least had cohesive plotlines with characters that we actually cared about (and one had a hit song, to boot!)..
Instead of having Billy Jack defending his beloved hippie friends like he did in later films, a group of sadistic evil bikers invade a small town and Mr. Jack is the only one who can stop them.
The Beginning of the Billy Jack Era. This was the start of the Billy Jack Legacy as this movie hit the theaters on August 18 1967 starring Tom Laughlin as Billy Jack, Elizabeth James as Vicky Barrington, and Jeremy Slate as Daniel Carmody.
Although many reviews of Billy Jack series complain about uneven slant to the left there is a very strong message in this film about the effects of over-liberalism of the law, as it pertains to the protection of the evil bikers.
This movie, something of a prequel to Billy Jack, starts off looking like a typical cheap biker film of the era, but somehow despite the poor performances and non-existent plot, manages to entertain on some levels.
Since Billy is the closest thing resembling a sympathetic character in the film, other than a girl victimized by the bikers, the viewer accepts his tough-guy approach to dealing with the biker gang.
This movie tries to portray Billy as a lone hope hero in a world gone wrong where few intervene on behalf of their fellow human being, and it comes off as being ridiculous in some ways, however despite that fact and Tom Loughlin's lacklustre performance as Billy, the character still exudes the quiet confidence of a western or kung-fu hero.
This was in 1960.Some of the bikers were real Hell's Angels and many local California residents played smaller roles.A great start for Tom Laughlin in the Billy Jack series.
So, I think a more involved Billy would have helped THIS movie - I kept waiting for Laughlin to perform, even if it's just to TALK more about his (Jack's) philosophies on life.The other interest is Jane Russell, in a supporting role.
Tom Laughlin's first film as Billy Jack, ex-Green Beret-turned-rancher living in Northern California who is continually mocked for his Indian blood and gentle manner.
Here, Billy Jack gets involved in taking on a hard-partying gang of bikers who have raped a group of girls only after the local police force prove to be completely useless.
Laughlin, who directed the film under the pseudonym T.C. Frank and wrote much of the screenplay, isn't as laconic (or iconic) as he would become in the sequels--he allows Billy Jack to be human, at times vulnerable and benign, and Laughlin as an actor has never appeared so boyish (his sheepish grin, when it appears, is utterly charming).
While fighting a band of bikers who terrorize a small beach community, Billy Jack finds time to fall in love with the incredibly beautiful Vicky.
Billy Jack was a movie which came out in 1971 starring Tom Laughlin who played an ex-military, Native American pacifist who used his feet (he was a martial artist) to right the wrongs imposed by the status quo.
Being his first outing as star, co-writer (his wife also did writing duties) & director, some things had to give & Billy Jack as a character seemed out of place or would just pop in out of nowhere ran contrary to the forward movement of the biker gang's onslaught & mayhem.
THE BORN LOSERS wasn't supposed to happen but thank God it did since BILLY JACK is one of the most embarrassing counter-culture action flicks ever made...Tom Laughlin in the title role as a part Indian do-gooder who defends a ridiculously "progressive" high school full of teens and preteens, singing corny protest songs off-key with beyond-novice acting disabilities, and a dated, obvious push for an older guy trying way too hard to relate to that era's flaky and spacey counter-culture youth...So it's much better, more universal and exploitation-entertaining that he defend three older, legally sexy college coeds who get raped by a gang of scruffy bikers while Billy Jack is, for most of THE BORN LOSERS, a quiet, ambiguous sort of Lonely Man character, taking his time to defend not only the girls, but himself...The plot's straight out of just about any cliché mafia movie where the feds need to hide/protect their witness...Local cops and parents are caught up in a vain attempt to keep the girls safe from the gang, who appear like wraiths in family rooms, bedrooms, kitchens, motels and around every corner in the typically semi-rural small town prone for this kind of violent takeover.
And in 1967, Biker was not just a person, but a Genre....A lot of rustic time's spent in a (seemingly non-public) pool hall where the brutes hang around like semi-retired, well-fed barbarians, featuring cult actors William Wellman Jr. as an apprehensive second-in-command beatnik type; Jeremy Slate as the bold chief spokesman; future Burt Reynolds stock villain Bob Tessier as one of several henchman; and smiling scene-stealer Jeff Cooper as a cocky good looking "kid," wielding somewhat clunky white man karate he'd later develop in Bruce Lee's posthumous pet-project CIRCLE OF IRON.
But he's no match for director Tom Laughlin's Billy, or, in another sense, the film's co-writer and resilient ingenue, Elizabeth James...As pretty Vicky Barrington, she's pretty much the buried-lead here, and Billy doesn't have to do much to keep her safe: Intrepid and smooth, with an almost too natural/comfortable non-acting acting style, she's a modern woman without being pushy or preachy...And is particularly effective in scenes playing mind games within the gang's grungy liar: in one scene, remaining composed while stripped to her bra and panties...By the time Billy Jack's got her back, after the gang raids his rogue's-own Vietnam vets' trailer Mel Gibson would later famously reside in in LETHAL WEAPON, it's now two against this fiendish band of marauders, who actually stand out from other sixties-cinema bikers: a little more human than banal-cliché, even while being extremely inhumane.Critics ranging from Leonard Maltin to Roger Ebert bashed the ironic choice of our hero striving for peace while kicking ass (i.e.
Tom Laughlin directed and starred as the eponymous Billy Jack, a native American character who is at odds with a vicious motorcycle gang.
The gang kidnaps Vicky from Deputy Fred and then she's rescued by Billy Jack.The acting is generally bad in this movie.
I really like Tom Laughlin and his followup film Billy Jack inspired me as a teenager in 1971.
In most situations, the two main characters ("Billy Jack" and the girl he's protecting) do whatever act would be most stupid at that time.
The legend of Billy Jack all started from this movie, "The Born Losers".
One of the First and Better Biker MoviesIntroduced Billy Jack.
It was the Bikers, Sex, Violence, and Counter-Culture elements.Billy Jack did help as a Center between Law Enforcement and the Bad Bikers and was a Semi-Interesting, if Stiff and Solemn Stud, and it was Laughlin's attempt to make Him a Hero, and He Was in this "Sleeper".But it was all of the other Strange and New Attractions in the Movie that made it a Box Office Phenom.
Worth a Watch for it helped Begin the Biker Cycle, and did Introduce Billy Jack, who, for Better or Worse did become a Pop Culture Icon.Note...The Wild One (1952) is considered the first Biker Movie, it starred Marlon Brando and Lee Marvin..
You know, I was really-Really-REALLY (!!) hoping that Born Losers was going to be a helluva lot better than it was.Yes. I'm very hip to the fact that this "product-of-its-time" (1967) was, in fact, an independent endeavor and filmed on a mere $360,000 budget - But, all the same, it basically wimped out about 70% of the time with its bargain-basement everything (from acting to dialogue to violence to philosophy).Co-written by its ambitious director and star, Tom Laughlin, apparently this film's underlying message was supposed to be geared to promoting peace, tolerance and understanding.
With shades of 1954's "The Wild One" hanging, like a tired cliché, over much of the action, Born Losers focuses in on the belligerent, in-your-face activities of the swastika-waving "Born To Lose" biker bad-boys who get their thrills terrorizing the folks of sunny Big Rock, California, and raping their virginal daughters for an added emphasis on entertainment.Naturally, our peace-lovin' hero, Billy Jack gets his toes stepped on once too often by these "Born To Lose" kids and that, in turn, provokes an inevitable climax of pure kick-ass retribution.This film predates "Easy Rider" by 2 years.
This movie shows how the main characteran ex Green Beret named Billy Jack,stands up to a vicious motorcycle gang.
He saves the heroine of the film from the psycho motorcycle gang.A very good movie that I first saw in the late sixties.This was the beginning of BillyJack.See it if you get thechance.
Tom Laughlin created an interesting character here, although he doesn't really have the physical complexion of a Native American, and is the most civilized and essential part of this film.There is a cameo scene with Jane Russell as the traumatized mother (her daughter has been raped by the gang).
I'm watching THE BORN LOSERS, the first Billy Jack movie.
Tom Laughlin directed and stars as Billy Jack, a former Green Beret and jaded Vietnam war veteran who is trying to live peacefully in a small California town that is overrun with a dangerous motorcycle gang that terrorizes residents.
That Billy ends up shooting the gang leader between the eyes (he DID warn him, though) is so anti-heroic that it rather spoils the film in some ways.Some of the camera work in BORN LOSERS borders on amateurish, the FAR side of amateurish that is.
Among the bikers rape victims is also Vicky Barrington, Elizabeth James, who was just riding through town on her motorcycle with nothing but a florescent white bikini on.
This was only because the movie was made before it's star writer and director Tom Laughlin got too philosophical and sermonizing,in his screenplays, due to the amazing financial success of the Billy Jack films, which gave Laughlin complete control in making them, that followed it.
This made it a much better film then the three later Billy Jack movies that besides their confusingly mystic and American Indian philosophy themes also had so many sub-plots, which "The Born Losers" didn't, that you got lost watching them long before they were finally over..
(the following may contains minor spoilers)i liked this first of four Billy Jack films.it's a simple story about one man who tries to fight injustice,usually(and reluctantly) with his feet and hands.in this film,the enemy happens to be a gang called The Born Losers(hence the title)who have been terrorize the neighbourhood and victimizing people.the film is well paced with some good fight sequences.the acting is also decent enough,for the most part although there are a couple of over actors in the bunch.overall,the movie is entertaining enough,although it sends mixed messages about violence and if it actually solves problems.anyway,for me,The Born Losers is an 8/10.
The exploits of these motorcycle gangs is the subject of this intense, shocking film.Actor and Director Tom Laughlin stars as Billy Jack, a half-white, half-Indian hero who saves the day at the end of the film.
The showdown between Billy Jack and the gang is straight out of a Western, except this time it's set in late 60's California.
This film is for men, though it's interestingly written by a woman, obviously friends with Director Tom Laughlin who stars as Billy Jack.
The over-the-top dialog and acting are part of what makes it so entertaining.Billy Jack, part Indian--if you can't tell that the man is Indian because of his cowboy hat and jeans, the movie points it out often--and part ex-Green Beret, single-handedly takes on the motorcycle gang who is terrorizing the seaside town of "Big Rock." Who can't say that the character of Billy Jack is a pop icon that will be remembered years from now?
"Billy Jack" (Tom Laughlin) is a former soldier who served with the Green Berets in Vietnam and has come back home to California to start a new life.
Similarly, "Vicky Barrington" (Elizabeth James) is on her way to meet her father when she also runs into this same motorcycle gang after which both she and Billy Jack realize that their lives are about to become closely intertwined.
Now rather than reveal any more of this movie I will just say that this was an enjoyable "biker film" which resulted in at least 3 "Billy Jack" sequels.
Elizabeth James, aka "Vicky," was a real "hottie." She was smooching all over Billy Jack at the end of the film.
This movie while not as good as it's follow up Billy Jack which may not really be a follow up at all, is still a great film for the time it was made in and the price it took to complete.