THE RETURN OF BILLY JACK: MOVIE FIGURE BEING USED TO STUDY '60s

At the height of the anti-Vietnam War sentiment in the U.S., youthful moviegoers swarmed to see a film called "Billy Jack." Billy Jack was a half-Indian Vietnam War hero who through a mystical prescience showed up at the right time to right injustices with karate kicks. Sometimes those kicks were aimed at the authorities.

Finding a critic who approved of "Billy Jack" or another in the series would be difficult, but now Billy Jack is back to teach us about the '60s.

Feb. 7, the Department of Sociology at Southeast will begin a four-part film series titled "The Legend of Billy Jack."

The low-budget movies accurately portray the look and the atmosphere of the mid- to late '60s, says Dr. Peter Hirschburg, a sociology professor at Southeast. "They filmed people in a town. It's not an attempt to recreate what the '60s looked like. That's what the '60s looked like."

Like "The Graduate," the Billy Jack movies also raise some of the questions that haunted the '60s. Unlike "The Graduate," Billy Jack provides an answer: Fight back. The theme song from "Billy Jack," "One Tin Soldier," became an anthem of youthful alienation, says Hirshburg, who also hosts the KRCU 90.9 FM movie music program "Themes Familiar."

Last semester's Sociology Film Series showed the movies "Blackboard Jungle," "Hard Day's Night" and "That Thing You Do" to examine the social effect of rock 'n' roll. Billy Jack films mix conspiracy theories, feminism, paranoia and a burgeoning Native American consciousness in a hero who, like Rambo later, went to jail for trying to do the right thing.

Tom Laughlin, the actor/director who created Billy Jack, is a quirky figure in film history. He ran one of the first Montessori schools in the U.S. and in 1992 ran for president as a Democrat.

Laughlin had supporting roles in "Gidget" and "South Pacific" and many other movies before "Billy Jack" came along. He and his wife, actress Delores Taylor, went to American International, a movie company known for exploitation films, with an idea for a movie about a Native American Vietnam vet. The company gave the OK with stipulations. "They said, If you give me motorcycles and rapes, I'll release it," Hirshburg says.

Laughlin gave them "Born Losers," a badly written 1967 movie in which teen-aged girls are molested by motorcyclists with names like Gangrene and Crabs.

But then came the 1971 phenomenon "Billy Jack," in which Laughlin plays the protector of the Indian reservation. "It's peace through violence," Hirschburg says.

In the wake of the movie's success, movie studios clamored for Laughlin. "He could have been another Mel Gibson," Hirschburg says. But Laughlin walked away from the offers and made 1974's "The Trial of Billy Jack" on his own.

Laughlin's last Billy Jack movie, "Billy Jack Goes to Washington," was never distributed to theaters.

"Born Losers" will begin the series with a showing at Feb. 7. "Billy Jack" will be show March 6, "The Trial of Billy Jack" March 27 and "Billy Jack Goes to Washington" April 25. All the movies will be shown at 5:30 p.m. at Parker Hall Room 108. The series is free and open to the public.