The Warriors (1979)

Directed by: Walter Hill | 89 minutes | action, crime, thriller | Actors: Michael Beck, James Remar, Dorsey Wright, Brian Tyler, David Harris, Tom McKitterick, Marcelino Sànchez, Terry Michos, Deborah Van Valkenburgh, Roger Hill, David Patrick Kelly, Lynne Thigpen, Dennis Gregory

The Warriors by director Walter Hill (Southern Comfort (1981), 48 Hrs. (1982)) opens with a shot of a Ferris wheel. The Warriors hail from Coney Island, an area on the outskirts of New York known for its carnival rides. Immediately after the murder in the Bronx, the Warriors are seen as the perpetrators and their chances of survival are equal to a wheel of fortune.

It soon becomes clear that street gangs are also all about teamwork. If the Warriors are to survive, they must work together at all costs. Swan, played by Michael Beck, is the never-smiling leader of the Warriors and is easily challenged by the unpredictable Ajax, a fine rendition of James Remar. Swan must pull out all the stops to keep the group together during the survival journey home. The times he fails and one of the Warriors leaves the group, things go wrong.

Gradually, you develop sympathy for the Warriors as they trek through the Big Apple. The gang consists of outcasts from society, who fight for a piece of territory and respect. During the day they are invisible, but at night they feel like kings of the streets. Until the final in Coney Island, The Warriors takes place in the dark of the night. Danger looms from every nook and cranny.

In addition, director Hill manages to portray the gang as people of flesh and blood. The picture of good and evil is blurred. It’s not just fighting or stealing. Every gang member has good and bad sides: one is the best brawler of the bunch, but beautiful women are his trap. The other is a good leader, but doesn’t seem to have any emotions.
Walter Hill also makes sure that The Warriors is not a sequence of violence. It is about giving and taking. The Warriors deal and take blows. Some don’t make it to the finish line and the others take stabs, punches and hits from baseball bats. A number of mats take place, to which the director has paid a lot of attention. Violence is magnified by the use of slow motion. The credibility of the fights may be up for debate, but let’s be honest: aren’t fistfights with a pair of painted baseball players or with a group of attractive lesbians extremely interesting?
Less positive about the story is the budding love between leader Swan and the girl Mercy, who meet halfway. The storyline adds nothing to the film, doesn’t show itself and seems forced. Strong, on the other hand, is the performance of Roger Hill, in the role of Cyrus, who plays the Jesus-like figure of all the gangs gathered in the Bronx. He enjoys the respect of everyone and intelligently knows how to get everyone on the same page, even if only for a moment. Strong text too: Can you dig it? Also worth mentioning is David Patrick Kelly, as the sneaky Luther.
The feeling of the film can be described as raw and sober and fits well into the era of the late 1970s and early 1980s. There is no room for jokes or nuances. You get what you see. On the street, the law of the fittest applies and the Warriors like to participate in the theory of evolution. The musical support of Barry de Vorzon, in the form of self-contained synthesizer sounds, creates an atmosphere of doom.

Michael Beck never played prominent roles after The Warriors, partly as a result of the flopping of his next movie Xanadu from 1980. The Warriors, on the other hand, grew into a cult film, if only because of the unusual outfits and hairstyles of many gang members. Its enduring popularity is evidenced by the release of a video game in 2005 and a remake of The Warriors in 2006.