Vitals

Willem Dafoe as Vance, lone biker and ex-convict

Rural Georgia, Summer 1959

Film: The Loveless
Release Date: August 7, 1981
Directed by: Kathryn Bigelow & Monty Montgomery

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Happy 70th birthday to Willem Dafoe, the versatile actor born July 22, 1955, in Appleton, Wisconsin—not far from Sheboygan, where I just spent the weekend!

After an uncredited part cut from Michael Cimino’s ambitious 1980 Western epic Heaven’s Gate, Dafoe made his credited screen debut as the lead in The Loveless, which also marked the directorial debut of Kathryn Bigelow and Monty Montgomery, who co-wrote the screenplay.

Dafoe stars as Vance, a brooding biker who describes himself as “what you’d call… ragged,” joining up with his small gang at a truck stop off U.S. Highway 17 in Georgia, en route to Daytona to catch the NASCAR races. The year’s never stated, but context clues—like the cars, music, and 10¢ Cokes—suggest the summer of 1959, the same year Lee Petty won the first Daytona 500.

As in the film’s spiritual predecessor The Wild One (1953), the gang sparks mixed reactions from the townspeople: suspicion and fear from the older generation, curiosity and desire from the younger. As the sun sets and the tension rises, both visitors and locals grow increasingly drunk… and increasingly armed. Continue reading →