Review: Hardcore (1979)
written and directed by Paul Schrader
Hardcore (1979)
written and directed by Paul Schrader
Paul Schrader's films are commonly about the failure of religious men to handle the demands of life dominated by capitalism. They've been taught that their faith will sustain them, but when it fails to, they often resort to violence of various kinds. This struggle is seen every day in the news, as evangelical pastors and Roman Catholic priests are brought to justice for abusing the women or children in their care, as domestic vilence cases explode, as men and youths reach a breaking point and commit a mass shooting.
In this story, a genial midwestern dad has to descend into the sex industry underworld in pursuit of his 15-year-old daughter, who has vanished while on a church youth trip to California.
The man, Jake VanDorn (George C. Scott), first hires a private investigator played by Peter Boyle as a two-faced, code-switching dirtbag. The PI is capable of saying the right things to the utterly square middle-class dad, but also, and clearly more naturally, to porn producers and other dirtbags in Los Angeles.
At first VanDorn waits in Grand Rapids for results. The scene where he sits forlornly on a back porch with three other men who have nothing comforting to say except things like "We can't understand God's plans" while gazing at a landfill across the road stuck in my mind for 40-plus years. These men aren't just glum because one man's daughter has vanished in California. They're Calvinists, a dour Midwestern faith that provides few opportunities for delight or amusement. In a previous scene they sat around debating humankind's depravity, not for a Bible class, but more or less for fun.
The turning point is when the PI shows VanDorn a porno featuring his daughter. VanDorn then takes matters into his own hands and jets out to California to find the girl himself.
He soon finds he can make headway only by pretending to be a porn producer himself, a plot line that provides, in one scene, the image of George C. Scott in a wig and fake mustache auditioning male porn actors for his pretend "sex action picture." With the cooperation of an actress named Niki (Season Hubley) who appeared with his daughter in the film he was shown, he finally tracks down his daughter in a San Francisco strip club.
But right before that, he encounters a trio of sex workers at a BDSM dungeon. "I'm Hope," says one of the women, motioning to the others: "and this is Faith and Charity." This is only the final ironic insertion of religious language during VanDorn's quest. Niki professes herself a Venusian -- a member of “the church of Venus.” She's pretty OK with being a sex worker, and the scenes in which she and VanDorn form an odd couple in pursuit of his daughter might serve as a basis for a comedy. And there are black-comedy moments, like the young porn director in a UCLA t-shirt who has artistic ambitions, or the porn actor who explodes into the motel room where VanDorn is holding auditions and exclaims "I'm Dick Blaque!!"
This film is quite obscure now. Only the most scrupulous fans of Paul Shrader (who also wrote Taxi Driver, another film that has child prostituion as a major plot point) are aware of it. But it's easily seen on Amazon Prime Video. As a director, Shrader is not flashy, and at this still early point in his career he's sinmply effective. Nevertheless, I was pleased at how well it held up after over 40 years.