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The Warrirors
Directed by Walter Hill
Review by Kennedy Weible
The Warriors,
the 1979 cult classic, is out in a new ultimate director's cut
edition. For those of you who have never seen The Warriors
(shame on you), here's a brief recap. Cyrus, leader of the biggest
gang in New York, called the Gramercy Riffs, sends delegates
to every other gang in town, summoning them to a rally in the
Bronx. He asks that each gang sends nine members, with no weapons,
and calls for a standing truce for the evening. Cyrus, a charismatic
svengali who looks like a young The Rock, is shot while at the
climax of his speech to the assembled gang-members at his detent.
He is shot by the leader of the Rogues, a greasy, slurred speech
kind of creep, who blames the murder on the Warriors. This accusation
travels through the crowd, and the Warriors become public enemy
number one to every gang in town, bent on revenge. They find
themselves in the middle of the Bronx, needing desperately to
get back to Coney Island-their turf.
That's the set up, and what follows is the journey home. The
plot is based loosely on Xenophon's "Anabasis," a story
of a platoon of Greek soldiers stuck in the middle of Persia,
who must fight their way back to the sea to get home. The Warriors
are also headed back to the sea. Well, kind of, they're headed
back to Coney, where the climax takes place on the beach by the
boardwalk.
The Warriors falls into the category of cult classic,
but it stands apart from the genre in a few important ways. Most
movies that get grouped under this banner fall into one or more
of a few sub-groups. Some are straight geek films, others are
so low budget that they have the warped appeal of a horrific
roadside accident, and others are the sort of so-bad-they're-good
movie, like the kind celebrated in the show Mystery Science
Theatre 3000. The Warriors, separates itself by actually
being a good movie.
The tale of the Warriors owes its success in large part to its
director, who believes wholly in the world he's created for his
characters. Set in the vague "Some time in the future,"
which, in this case looks a lot like New York circa 1985, the
world of the Warriors at no time brushes up against reality.
With a few minor exceptions, there are no regular people in the
movie. There are only gang-members, and police as the Warriors
fight their way back home. This world is New York as pure urban
jungle. At one point members of a gang called the Orphans, peer
at the Warriors from rooftops and alleyways like pygmies popping
out from behind trees to glare at Dr. Livingston.
The Orphans live up to their name by being the wussiest gang
in all of New York. They weren't even invited to Cyrus's shindig.
The Baseball Furies on the other hand, who haunt the area around
96th street, wear full pinstripe uniforms, KISS-style makeup,
and wield bats like samurai swords, are possibly the coolest
(next to the Warriors of course). Other gangs include some mixed
race skinheads (the Turnbull A.C.), some mimes, and a gang of
dudes in overalls, the leader of whom rollerskates around the
empty Union Square station in a menacing fashion. The Warriors
themselves rock brown leather vests with a flying skull on the
back.
Why, you may be asking yourself, don't the Warriors just take
their vests off, and go back to Coney incognito? As Swan, the
leader, eloquently puts it, "We don't do that." Look,
that's just not how the Warriors roll, accept it.
The Warriors is also shot almost entirely on location,
rather than on a sound stage. So while the lighting isn't extraordinary,
the film has a verities style, and portrays actual subway stations,
parks, and street corners. There's a grimy beauty in some of
the shots, like Swan's solo walk through a subway station, and
the shots of the Warriors rolling up on the Orphans on rain-slicked
streets.
Those who are already fans of the movie will love the DVD's documentary
in the Special Features section, where the director, writer,
producer, and a handful of the actors talk about all things Warriors
for about an hour and half. There's also the original trailer
for the film, and an introduction to the movie by the director.
The only problem with the DVD is that there roughly eight different
previews when you first put the disc in, that defied skipping
or fast forwarding with a little message that popped up on my
screen saying "operation currently prohibited by disc."
What's up with DVDs doing this, and why has no one stomped the
guy who came up with it Warriors style?
Great movie, great DVD. Come out and play.
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