Southern Comfort

1981 "It's the land of hospitality... unless you don't belong there."
7.1| 1h45m| R| en| More Info
Released: 24 September 1981 Released
Producted By: 20th Century Fox
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Synopsis

A squad of National Guards on an isolated weekend exercise in the Louisiana swamp must fight for their lives when they anger local Cajuns by stealing their canoes. Without live ammunition and in a strange country, their experience begins to mirror the Vietnam experience.

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Reviews

DipitySkillful an ambitious but ultimately ineffective debut endeavor.
StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.
Numerootno A story that's too fascinating to pass by...
Skyler Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.
ivo-cobra8 It is one of my personal favorite best war movies of all time and favorite from been a hunted to become a hunter. I love, love this movie to death. I love the setting that it was filmed in the forest and in the swamps. The soldiers got lost and are now hunted from Cajuns. Because they stole their canoes and a soldier for a joke fired at them with blank bullets, but Cajuns returned fire and kill on of the soldiers. The other eight soldiers are now hunted on enemy turf, without live animation, compass, and the map they lost they must fight for survival. Walter Hill directed perfectly this film. "The thrill of the hunt is the ultimate drug" - the line is from Hard Target it is still a thrill film an edge on your seat. This is my childhood movie, I grew up watching it today I still love this movie today and I have purchased the Blu-ray disc and I watch it so many times on VHS tape. I think the acting performance from all the actors was decent. I love the music score by Ry Cooder I think it is very beautiful. What can I say? I love this movie to death I always enjoy watching this movie. I watched in Thursday this movie with my dad and even he enjoyed this movie just like I did. He said he loves this movie just like me. Squad of nine Louisiana National Guard soldiers are Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Fred Ward, Franklyn Seales, T. K. Carter, Lewis Smith , Les Lannom, Peter Coyote and Alan Autry and they are believable. Powers Boothe and Franklyn Seales both really died in real life and are sadly no longer with us anymore. I am written this cause I love this movie to death and no one talks about it. Like this movie doesn't exit. I am a huge fan of this film. I have been an enthusiastic fan of Walter Hill's 1981 film, Southern Comfort, since childhood, and I believe that it is one of the most perfect movies of that decade in terms of its ability to maintain intensity to a nail-biting conclusion. A lot has been written about this film as an allegory for the war in Vietnam, but I prefer simply to take Southern Comfort at face value as a brilliant horror story. When a squad of nine National Guardsmen antagonize some reclusive Cajuns in the bayous of Louisiana, they find themselves fighting for their lives in drab swamp setting that is presented as a villain in its own right. They are on enemy territory crossing through swamps without any real ammunition, their compass and the map they lost in the swamp alone and tired the hunt is on in this game for survival. Unlike contemporary survival horror movies where one never gets the impression that the characters are actually outdoors at any point in the film, Southern Comfort is rugged to an extreme, with the actors constantly wading ankle-deep through swamp lands in the middle of winter, since filmmakers quickly determined that the filming location would be too hazardous during the summer season. For most of the film, the Cajun hunters are depicted as terrifyingly wraith like figures that are only seen in split-second glimpses through the trees. This movie has some of the most harrowing death scenes that I have ever witnessed on screen, by way of gunshots to the head, horrific booby traps, and, most notably, an unset ting sequence where a character disappears in quicksand that is subsequently shown in a serene shot as though nothing happened. A beautifully atmospheric Ry Cooder soundtrack works wonders to bring the viewer into the bayou. Just when the viewer thinks that the most tense moments of Southern Comfort have come to pass, the film ratchets up the unnerving horror with a conclusion that feeds on paranoia in a crowded setting. A few key visuals, namely two rope nooses being thrown over a support beam and a pig slaughter, are strikingly effective in a way that recalls the best of Universal Horror films or German expressionism, while the faces of strangers gets under the skin in a way that recalls movies like Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Through it all, Southern Comfort presents us with memorable characters by way of convincing "lived-in" dialogue and tough guy archetypes that may or may not snap in the face of danger. It's easy to buy the notion that the nine Guardsmen are real people who have known one another for a long time, but simply tolerate one another's company during monthly weekend training exercises. The authenticity of these interactions is the strength that sold the premise to me when I first saw this movie on a cable channel almost 30 years ago. R.I.P. Franklyn Seales (1952-1990) and Powers Boothe (1948-2017) you are both really missed. Southern Comfort is a 1981 American action/thriller film directed by Walter Hill and written by Michael Kane, and Hill and his longtime collaborator David Giler. It stars Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Fred Ward, T. K. Carter, Franklyn Seales, and Peter Coyote. 10/10 Bad Ass Seal Of Approval my favorite childhood movie from Walter Hill of all time a really masterpiece classic they don't make movie like this anymore.
Riley Porter Probably the greatest strength of this film is its characters. While they can sometimes be a bit one note, the interaction of the different personalities I would say is the driving force of the film. While a couple of the guys in the main group are a little underwritten, they are at least easy to understand in their motivations and relationships with each other. I think that if this film had put too much focus on what can be considered to be the main character then the weakness of the character writing would have become a much greater issue. It's actually very enjoyable to see the difficult situation presented in the film debated by the different personalities of the main squad. I would say though, that if you find that you don't care much for the way the core cast performs, then there's not much left to really make you like this film.The visual style of this film is very hit or miss. Frankly the first five minutes or so of screen time does not make a strong impression. If anything it's a bit of a turn off. The film actually feels like a bit of a directionless void until the main cast is finally assembled and the mission is underway. After that the visuals improve to a pretty noticeable degree. The way the scenery, composed nearly entirely of swamp, is shot can sometimes give it an otherworldly feel. At a certain point it feels like the characters are drudging through a complete hellscape, driving home the feeling of desperation felt by the main squad. Of course there are still some visual hurdles which are a bit jarring. The presence of a couple of freeze frames and a bizarre faded in double image sort of undercut the tone of the scenes they're in. So in that way the flubs sort of balance out the nicer shots to make a film that's a bit visually muddled.So far as the story is concerned, it's typical military fair. It becomes obvious at a certain point the visual and narrative parallels to Vietnam war films. It's admittedly a clever way to retell a familiar sort of story, though there isn't much else which really elevates the narrative beyond the clichés of its contemporaries. Beyond that there are some logical issues with the way some of the traps, deadly obstructions of the squad, are actually executed. You'll know it when you see it.Overall, it's alright. Check it out if you think you might like it.
fullbug My best guess is that this is a statement being made by Walter Hill with regards to the Vietnam War. Movies like Platoon also depicted this kind of mindless idiocy on the part of US troops, including violent or threatening behaviour towards innocent civilians. It probably happened lots in Namm...and to what extent, probably still happens today.Totally mixed feelings watching this flick. US troops are supposed to be the good guys, but because of my utter disgust of their characters and behaviour, I eagerly anticipate for at least some of them to be "offed" by the indigenous civilians that they wronged.After being hit with various boobie traps, attack dogs, and even fatal casualties due to fighting amongst themselves (meatheads), without disclosing the ending, the only soldiers left in trying to escape the swamps (and their Cajun pursuers) are the only ones that you placed any sympathy with and had half a brain.If not for the production quality and all-star cast, I would have rated this movie much lower. As it stands, it is actually a pretty decent movie, but the annoying factor is fairly high.
oscarschrover This picture seems a very obvious 'thing'. You are hunting men or are being hunted by other men. More important than this classic paleontic scheme is the way society is being portrayed. And government and its institutions. The national guard is seen in this movie as a jumble of wacko's, first there is a goofy goon shooting blanks at local primitives, getting his sergeant killed, then there is a private that should be hospitalized as a serious case of insanity, thirdly an insecure platoon, amongst which there is an afro-American pushing drugs to school-kids, leaving out only two sane men. One comes from a redneck environment and graduated college, and the other one is a gentlemanly Southern pimp. Either the national guard should be abolished if this was true or people should seriously question their appetite for adventurous but anti-society entertainment and they should look for more reality in the movie they are craving. Lots of stereotyping in this movie. But hey made 30 years. America is much wiser now. No?