White Line Fever

Plot synopsis:
=== Backstory ===
Sam Hummer was a local truck driver from Tucson, Arizona who worked for a Tucson-based produce-shipper called "Red River". His driving partners were Duane Haller and "Pops" Dinwiddie. Eventually Sam's son, Carrol Jo, is old enough to ride with his father and the two of them then become partners as well. Sam changes the lettering on the trailer of his rig to read "Sam Hummer and Son".
Carrol Jo begins dating Jerri and the two want to be married, but Sam dies and the trucking partnership suddenly ends. As a result, Carrol Jo joins the Air Force and is soon sent to Vietnam. While in Vietnam, Carrol Jo has a successful career and is deemed a hero, but all he wants to do is return home to Jerri. Jerri spends these years waiting for his return and this is the subject of the film's theme song "Drifting and Dreaming" by Valerie Carter. The opening sequence shows Carrol Jo's plane arriving from overseas as Jerri and her brother give him a hero's welcome. We see the two get married and start their life together in humble settings.
=== Story ===
Carrol Jo obtains a loan from the bank to purchase a new truck. He and Jerri then visit a local used truck sales lot where he purchases a repossessed 1974 Ford WT9000 cabover rig with a Cummins turbo diesel engine. The salesman throws in a custom paint job to seal the deal and Carrol Jo picks a blue and white paint scheme, highlighted with the words "BLUE MULE". Later, the two are jubilant as they drive their new truck through the deserts around Tucson, imagining the new life that awaits them.
CJ announces to the local listeners on the CB radio that he is in business for himself and is intent on getting as much as he can, so that he can get out of hock to the bank as quickly as possible.
When CJ goes back to work at Red River he finds out that things are very different. Duane Haller informs him that the company is now hauling un-taxed cigarettes and slot machines and that if he wants to stay out of trouble and keep working, he’ll have to keep his mouth shut. CJ gets angry and forces his rig to be unloaded, vowing never to haul illegal cargo. Later, Carroll Jo is pulled over on a lonely highway and discovers that the local sheriff is in on the crooked dealing as well, when he is handcuffed to his truck. Three men from Red River then show up and break his ribs.
When CJ tries to find work at other trucking companies around Tucson, he discovers that Red River has blackballed him as a troublemaker, and he is unwelcome everywhere he goes. Livid, he returns to Red River with a shotgun and threatens Duane Haller. Duane informs him that he is just a pawn in the game and that the person he actually needs to talk to is Duane’s boss, Buck Wessler (L.Q. Jones). Buck is a sleazy, lower-level crook who now manages Red River. Buck agrees to let CJ take a load to Dallas, free of any contraband. Sam Hummer’s old friend “Pops” Dinwiddie decides to come along, to help keep Carroll Jo safe on his trip. En route, they are attacked by men from Red River, but manage to fight them off and continue on their way.
Throughout the rest of the story, Carroll Jo tries to make a living by driving daily loads in and out of Tucson, mainly for Red River. He slowly discovers that Red River is actually owned by a large corporation based in Phoenix called the “Glass House”, a diversified energy and transportation company. Unbeknownst to him, though, Glass House is actually a front for organized crime. They use the trucking companies that they own as a transportation system for their syndicate and its illegal shipments.
Over the course of several months, CJ tries to organize the other drivers at Red River and around Tucson to stand up to the Glass House and refuse to haul illegal cargo. In the process he is beaten, vandalized, cheated and then eventually framed for Duane Haller’s murder. After his acquittal, CJ discovers the body of Pops Dinwiddie, who has been driving the Blue Mule while CJ was in jail, in his house. This leads to a climactic confrontation between all of the Red River drivers and Buck at the loading dock. Carroll Jo beats Buck, until CJ’s brother-in-law pulls him off of him.
That night, CJ and Jerri are viciously attacked while they sleep and their house is set on fire. Carroll Jo wakes up and gets both of them out of the house before it burns down. At the hospital, the doctor informs him that Jerri has lost the baby she was carrying and will never be able to have children. CJ returns home in despair.
Moments later, he emerges from the house with a shotgun and gets into the Blue Mule. He radios Deputy “Bob” that he is headed for the Glass House and to tell them that he is coming. Bob tries to intercept him on a two-lane road, but Carroll Jo runs the deputy off the road, destroying his patrol car. CJ shows up at the Glass House headquarters, faced by several heavily armed security guards who are waiting for him. He accelerates as fast as he can toward them, but his truck is riddled with bullets, blowing out several tires, the radiator and the windshield. CJ takes one bullet to the face. He manages to run through the security gauntlet, but he knows he won’t be able to get the crippled truck all the way to the corporate headquarters, so he aims for the giant sign that stands in front of the building, an enormous two-story glass structure with the letters “GH”. Carroll Joe runs up an embankment leading to the sign and crashes through it, completely destroying it and his truck at the same time.
In the last scene, a TV news reporter is announcing that all truckers in Tucson are on strike. The strike is being held in protest of the corrupt system set up by the Glass House and in honor of one trucker who dared to stand up against them, Carroll Jo Hummer. CJ’s brother-in-law wheels him out of his hospital room to the parking lot, which is filled with semi-trucks and truckers. They all begin to clap. Carroll Jo then begins to smile. Jerri is in a window directly behind him (apparently still hospitalized herself), overlooking all of this. Her lack of a smile may indicate that she is still unsure about living her life as the wife of a whistle-blowing hero who is willing to die for his family and the truth.

Tags: violence

Review:
The CB radio craze was at its height when this movie first came out (I saw it on a double bill with "Jaws" at an outdoor)and the country was fascinated by the lives of long distance truckers.
These concepts coalesce in this fast-paced and tough action movie.Carroll Jo Hummer is an independent long haul trucker whose whole life is tied up in two things: his wife and his truck The Blue Mule.
When his greasy boss Duane (good ol' boy Slim Pickens) puts the arm on Hummer to deliver illegal cigarettes and slot machines, Carroll Jo refuses to go along.
In doing so, he becomes an inspiration to other wildcat truckers looking to buck the system but he also becomes the target of a vicious campaign of intimidation endorsed by the corporate slimeballs in their ivory towers.There's fist-fighting, road racing and down and dirty dialog galore as Hummer's war with his enemies escalates to "Walking Tall" levels.
The concluding image of the Blue Mule smashing the glass emblem of the corrupt corporation is iconic.This is a B-movie for sure and no Oscar contender, but the lives of the truckers are portrayed with some grit and realism.
Jan-Michael Vincent does fine as Hummer and it may be one of the best roles of his career (he did all his own stunts).And how can you go wrong with a 70's cast that includes L.Q. Jones, Dick Miller, R.
This film catapulted Jan-Michael Vincent to stardom level for awhile, and contained a lot of good, exciting action scenes as well as politically correct assessment of some of the problems of independent truckers at the time.
Of course, it contained some action and fighting scenes that are somewhat unbelievable, but in the context of the story, they work.
There are lots of eye-pleasing shots of trucks and highway mayhem, and, of course, from a trucker and real-life perspective, lots of technically inaccurate scenes, but, all in all one of the very best trucking movies ever made -- and I've seen 'em all!
Without crossing over into making a film only truckers and their kin would enjoy, they kept the story and the action fast-paced yet clear as to what is happening unseen.
Even though it is a semi-cheesy "B" movie by any standard, the characters are easily related to and the storyline is easy to get involved with, and the action is fun without getting too excessive (gee- a trucker who isn't a gravity defying martial artist!).Jan-Michael Vincent is at perhaps his best, with Kay Lenz as the perfect naggy whiny trucker's old lady- just cute enough to want to come home to.
Some of the old country tunes actually sound pretty good even today (though the twang twang stuff, and the musically reproduced truck horns grew old after while)..
Not being close to the trucking industry, I don't know how accurate a picture it paints for today, but I believe it hits pretty close for 1975..
Don't get me wrong - the truck chase scenes are great too, but the bad guys in this movie kind of suck.
And the end - after the great truck crashing into the sign moment - really makes no sense at all.Just take this for what it is - a strange 70's action movie with good eye candy in it!.
Best trucking movie ever ?.
He's an honest man looking to make an honest living but ends up fighting the corrupt system, a true classic of the seventies.
The film rolls along at a fairly good pace and is for the most part quite believable, the finale has the hero driving his truck through a large sign in a highly symbolic gesture.
However White Line Fever is a classic of its time and in my opinion a remake would never match the originals simple plot and drama without adding too many unnecessary distractions.
There have been very few good trucking movies ever made, so hopefully this one will be re-released..
To be fair even I half way through the movie I thought how on Earth are they going to end this.A unique trucker movie inasmuch as Trucker movies are usually a lot lighter this has some very dark and heavy moments which in turn keeps the viewer unsettled which is only a good thing in an action drama.But the Director needs to look up the word 'Revenge' in a dictionary or at least ask Charles Bronson (Once upon a time in the west) how it's done.The entire cast put in a good performance and the script and pacey direction keep things moving.
Totally fabricated movie with great truck driving scenes..
The other stuff like the plot and ending are apparently fabricated just so we could have a place for the great action.
White Line Fever gets the point across that truck driving is a great way of life.
Jan-Michael Vincent stars in this B-movie from the Redneck Renaissance which has an ex-military man buying a rig to achieve the American dream along w/his doting wife.
Co-starring 2 Sam Peckinpah regulars L.Q. Jones & Slim Pickens, this breezy actioner is a throwback to a simpler time when CG were just 2 letters that meant nothing..
I love 70's cult cinema, I adore trucker movies and I absolutely worship Jan-Michael Vincent whom I consider to be one of the few genuine dukes of coolness amongst B-movie actors.
Hummer's father was a respected trucker in rural Arizona, but he died and Carroll Jo wants to continue the family's trucking tradition.
Finding work isn't really a problem, but the Arizona trucking business is being controlled by corrupt and fraudulent big shots who insist on smuggling stolen and illegal goods.
Okay, admittedly "White Line Fever" contains rather too many tedious parts simply showing trucks on the road and the screenplay is chock-full of clichés, but the whole ambiance and settings are irresistibly 70's.
Handsome Jan-Michael also receives excellent support from a nice assembly of reliable B-movie actors like Slim Pickens, LQ Jones and Dick Miller.
Many fans of cult and exploitation cinema refer to "White Line Fever" as the best trucker movie ever made.
Carrol Jo Hummer (Jan-Michael Vincent) returns home from the Air Force to marry Jerri (Kay Lenz).
When he's the lone Rambo at the end, Pops is riding shotgun in one of the action scenes.
Jan-Michael Vincent, at the peak of his charisma and movie stardom, registers strongly as good, honest young man Carrol Jo Hummer, fresh from a stint in the Air Force.
He gets a loan, which he uses to pay for his own diesel truck, which he dubs The Blue Mule.
Initially thinking of working for family friend Duane Haller (Slim Pickens), he ultimately decides to fight corruption in the transport business, making enemies out of slimy people like Buck Wessle (L.Q. Jones) and Cutler (Don Porter).
It gets a lot of mileage out of its time honoured premise of one good man at war with a corrupt system.Carrol Jo must do battle both on the road and off, and proves himself capable of handling himself in a number of scraps, which are often instigated by swaggering bully Clem (Martin Kove).
This NEEDS to be on DVD (its Sony/Columbia which gives me hope that it might one day see release on their Midnite Madness line of DVDs.) The story is a little confusing--but the movie is so fast moving and so colorful and so involving---the fact that the story keeps flipping the position of whether Jan Michael Vincent is in or out of the corrupt organization who keep alternatively trying to kill him and employ him (sometimes at the same time) just adds to the movie's charm!
(really quickly the story is Jan Michael Vincent is a back from 'Nam truck driver who goes to work for a corrupt organization and rebels against their corruptness--he wants to unionize and only haul what he wants to haul--not the illegal contraband that his bosses want him to traffic in----and his bosses in turn try to kill him, his wife, and just about everybody else who happens to be driving on the road around him---that's it----Jan tries to testify in court about their corruption, but that doesn't really matter--because a couple of scenes later--he's back to driving his truck for the very same guys that he was just testifying against---what?
There are a number of very well shot sequences---the first time Jan Michael has enough of his bosses b.s.--and they fire him---he marches back in his bosses' office with a gun--he forces them to give him work at gunpoint!
Its a very well done sequence (although if you stop and think about it given the plot as its unfolded it doesn't make a whole Lotta sense--but hey A Man's Gotta Work And Put Food On The Table Damnit!) And Then They Drive Him Too Far--which leads to a very depressing ending--but an awesomely depressing one!!!!
I Saw White Line Fever many years ago when I was doing my weekend warrior thing and this was playing on the post theater in I believe Fort Stewart, Georgia.
I wouldn't be surprised, but that back in those days Jan Michael Vincent was a number one star there.It's actually a pretty good film in which Vincent plays a working class hero who stands up to gangsters trying to control the trucking industry.
He's an Air Force veteran who marries the girl of his dreams in this case Kay Lenz and buys a big rig which he names the Blue Mule and pronounces himself ready to enter the truck driving game.Some really nasty people are in control of it though and when Vincent proclaims he won't haul illegal cigarettes and slot machines they come down on him like a ton of bricks.
They hurt him in every way possible, even people like Slim Pickens who was once his father's best friend.But Vincent is a charismatic figure and the independent drivers rally to him.
It all comes at a big price.A nice group of the best character actors around including Don Porter, L.Q. Jones, and R.G. Armstrong are some of the foes he faces as Jan Michael goes up the food chain of villainy.The film owes a lot to some of Frank Capra's work, especially Mr. Smith Goes To Washington.
Jan-Michael Vincent takes on good ol' boy truckers in hixploitation at it's finest!.
Jan-Michael Vincent plays an idealistic long-haul truck driver who wants no part of shipping illegal un-taxed cigarettes and slot machines (which by today's criminal standards seems positively quaint) for corrupt shipping company owner L.Q. Jones.
Co-staring Slim Pickens, R.G. Armstrong, Dick Miller, and Martin "Sweep the Leg" Kove, "White Line Fever" is super fun hixploitaiton with good ol boys cussin', fighting' and driving big rigs.
I've always loved Jan-Michael Vincent's early work and in reflection upon his career have been fascinated and somewhat haunted a quote from Vincent, lamented that he could have been another James Dean if he'd made only three movies and then died, instead of seeing his career and personal life spiral out of control with drugs, alcohol, and multiple arrests (he's now even minus a leg).
But back to "White Line Fever," this film was written and directed by Roger Corman protege Jonathan Kaplan, who'd later go on to write and direct some major films, including "The Accused" and "Unlawful Entry," so it's an early work by a quality filmmaker, which bring quality to this unabashedly low-brown exploitation drive-in material.
Overall, "White Line Fever" is one of Jan-Michael Vincent's better films and is solid entertainment if you're in the mood for "Convoy" meets "Walking Tall.".
I think it has one of the most awesome stunts with a truck at the end.
Yep still a great movie.It made me want to drive a truck then and today I do.It's the classic battle of David and Goliath so to speak.
where could you even assemble a cast like the one in this movie today.
Movies back then were all about stunts, and cool cars and trucks getting trashed big time.
The producers did a top job on getting the right looking truck for the movie, the Blue Mule was a sharp lookin rig, for a while there..
One of the earliest -- and hence best -- of a handful of 70's trucker movies, a once quite hot, but now hopelessly passé sub-genre which beget a mixed bag of films which includes the stellar Claudia Jennings vehicle "Truck Stop Women," the not half bad Peter Fonda pic "High Ballin'," the great'n'gritty overlooked sleeper "Road Movie," Sam Peckinpah's excruciatingly stupid "Convoy," the alarmingly atrocious Chuck Norris chopsocky turkey "Breaker!
Breaker!," and the sturdy made-for-TV item "Steel Cowboy." Jan-Michael Vincent, whose career in the Me Decade was all over the map, peaking with "The Mechanic" and "Big Wednesday" and hitting a wonderfully wretched all-time low with the gloriously godawful post-nuke sci-fi atrocity "Damnation Alley," here gives one of his strongest, most convincing and engaging performances to date as Carrol Jo Hummer, an earnest, moral, youthful independent Diesel driver who finds out that his employers are crooked bastards who sell illegal contraband on the side.
Director Jonathan Kaplan, who was then on a real B-movie roll churning out such kick-ass exploitation flicks as "Night Call Nurses," "The Student Teachers," and "Truck Turner" on a regular basis, hits a brisk, solid groove at the very start of the film and masterfully sustains it to the thrilling end, expertly milking the forever effective and appealing "one lone little man against the big, bad system" populist hero subtext in Ken Friedman's tightly efficient script for maximum socko entertainment.
Kudos also to the exceptional supporting cast ridden with familiar film faces: the late, great, ever-delightful Slim Pickens as corrupt truck stop manager Duane Haller, L.Q. Jones at his most sublimely slimy and serpentine as head heavy Buck Westle, Martin Kove as one of Westle's thuggish goons, R.G. Armstrong as a shifty, manipulative prosecuting attorney, veteran character actor Don Porter as the smug CEO who's running the whole no-count operation, frequent Kaplan pic co-star Johnny Ray McGhee as an angry black trucker, Sam Laws as McGhee's rascally lovable ol' coot pop, and the irreplaceable Dick Miller as fidgety, peppery gear-jammer R.
Further enhanced by Fred Koenekamp's crisp, inventive cinematography, David Nichtern's stirring score, and Valerie Carter tearfully warbling the marvelously mawkish country-and-western weeper "Drifting and Dreaming of You" all of three times on the soundtrack, "White Line Fever" gets a hearty ten-four from your good buddy film critic as quintessential 70's drive-in cinema at its most bluntly exciting and unpretentious best..
Great action flick with well-written characters, often compared to "Billy Jack" and "Walking Tall."  Fistfights and tough guys galore, Kay Lenz looking adorable, what more could you ask for?
Climactic scene of Jan-Michael Vincent's "Blue Mule" diesel tractor truck barreling through a guard shack and becoming airborne is one of the most memorable bits of 70's action cinema.
***SPOILERS*** The back then, before he messed himself up big time, sturdy & handsome Jan Michael Vincent in one of his most memorable roles as trucker Carrol Jo Hummer as he hums across the screen in his shinny $34,000.00, that's about $175,000.00 in 2016 dollars, rig the "Blue Mule" that he's deep in hock to the bank.
That in him trying to make a living trucking produce like apples oranges onions & avocados across state lines.
Instead of trucking fruit and vegetables for American families tables Jo finds out he's in fact shipping illegal contraband-Like un taxed cigarettes booze as well as pin ball and slot machines that supplies the mob's cash flow in the state of Arizona.By not going alone with the program Jo puts himself as well as wife Jerri, Kay Lenz, lives in danger of getting whacked by mob enforcer and president of the Red River Trucking Company Buck "Big Bucks" Wessle, played by 65 I.Q Jones, hoods working for him as truck drivers as well as enforcers.
At first blackballing Jo from getting work in paying off the bank loan for his rig he starts to organizes the truckers to demand equal pay for equal work-honest work-that really puts him on "Big Bucks" sh*l or cow manure list.
That with "Big Buck" getting the word from his boss corrupt businessman and mob controlled hack Josh Cutler, Don Porter, to put the squeeze on the rebellious young man and get him into line or in the hospital with a pair of broken legs if not worse.
This besides getting worked over a number of times and having his rig damaged Jo is later framed for his friend Duane Haller's, Slim Pickens, murder who was crushed to death by one of "Big Buck's" drivers in a hit and run homicides.
Shot up but still alive and breathing Jo in the end united the truckers to form a union and not be screwed around by the likes of Cutler as his lackey "Big Bucks" as well as the mob that their in cahoots or in bed with!.
"White Line Fever" was a big hit on the drive-in circuit when it was released.
The whole trucking industry angle, for one thing, though even more appealing is the irresistible there of the "little guy" against a corrupt system.
Jan-Michael Vincent makes for an appealing little guy hero, fighting against some nice bad guys, including the dependable L.
"White Line Fever" is an American trucking/action movie about truck drivers released in 1975.Jan-Michael Vincent plays the hero who returns from Vietnam and takes over his father's trucking business in Tucson,Arizona.He soon discovers that the shippers are corrupt and want him to smuggle illegal loads of cigarettes and slot machines.When he refuses to load such commodities they load his trailer with manure out of spite."White Line Fever" features truly fantastic climax in which Jan-Michael Vincent crashes his truck into the giant sign of the greedy corporation.The film is well-acted,the action is fast-paced and there is an enjoyable country score.8 trucks out of 10.