**SPOILERS** With the earth-shaking success of his last film "Billy Jack" that took in an astounding 35 million in ticket sales in the box office, compared to the $500,000.00 that it took him to produced, Tom Laughlin-who played the fearless and sh*t-kicking half Indian half Irishman Green Beret hero in the film- was more then eager to follow up that movie with a sequel.
Having Billy arrested and brought to trial for the karate kicking death of Bernard Rosner in "Billy Jack" it was a given that a film had to be made, the public demanded it, of Billy's trial and how he handles himself on the stand like he did handling the bad guys in the movie. Sad to say the 170 minute movie "The Trial of Billy Jack" was not really about his trial, that lasted no more then ten minutes of screen time, but the suffering of Billy's girlfriend Jean Roberts, Delores Taylor. It was Jean together with some 50 students of her government funded Freedom School who was gunned down by a bunch of trigger happy national guardsmen in a Kent State-like massacre in them being mistaken for being a gang of home grown terrorists and drug crazed, on pot, hippies. Almost the entire film is told in flashback by a crippled Jean in her hospital bed in how a series of tragic events lead to the school massacre that she's a survivor of.
Having been released from prison after serving five years for involuntary manslaughter, the justifiable death of Bernard Rosner, Billy is back in town, or on the Indian reservation, and with a new outlook on life. Going into the mountains to have his soul cleansed of all impurities like violence and revenge Billy hopes to become a true Christ-like pacifist and man of love where his ability and skills of the martial arts would no longer be useful, or beneficial, to him. In that Billy Jack's film success is based on his sh*t kicking abilities not his turn the other cheek pacifism you know that his peaceful and passive outlook on life, as well as his and the Freedom School's enemies, wouldn't last too long!
It's when Jean's students start to expose local as well as national, from the president on down, crooked politicians and their big business supporters with a serious of scorching exposes on the students-run TV station that those who run the country, and our lives, decide to put their foot down; On Jean's and her student's necks. Using a bunch of paid off American Indian leaders to sell their people out, by signing away their land rights, the late Bernard's father Mr. Posner, Riley Hill, who runs to state bank has Jean and her students threatened and harassed at every turn in having their precious Freedom School taken away from them. It's when Posner & Co. try to take over the secrete Indian Land adjutant to the Freedom School, as well as the school itself, that Billy who's been in deep meditation with his both dead as well as live Indian ancestors, as well as his deep inner self, comes on the scene.
It's after a series of minor attacks on Jean and the Freedom school, like the bombing the TV station, that Rosner and his goons decide to go full tilt and finally put an end to the school's activities once and for all. That's In the schools, through a series of scorching exposes, exposing Rosner and his fellow crook's crimes against the Amerian Indians, as well as the American people. Rosner & Co. being totally unsuccessfully in putting Jean and her Freedom School out of business now plans to have the state and federal government do their dirty work for them.
Nowhere as good as the previous Billy Jack movies, "Born Losers" & "Billy Jack", the film "The Trial of Billy Jack" despite it's marathon-like screen time, a world-class marathon runner runs that race faster then the length of the movie, it's not at all boring. What really spoiled the movie for me is that I expected, but knowing better, Billy to throw off his violent past and become a true man of the spirits where violence would be the absolute last thing on his mind. The fact that Billy was so eager to use his fists and feet instead of his spiritual attributes, as a peaceful and environmentally conscious American Indian, made him no better then the violent and mindless brutes that confronted him in the movie!
P.S The movie had Billy Jack at his trial bring out how the infamous Lt. Calley's Mi Lie massacre of some 300 Vietnamese villagers was covered up by the then President of the United States Richard Nixon. The fact is that the Mi Lie massacre happened on March 16, 1968 when at the time Lyndon Johnson, not Nixon, was President.
Having Billy arrested and brought to trial for the karate kicking death of Bernard Rosner in "Billy Jack" it was a given that a film had to be made, the public demanded it, of Billy's trial and how he handles himself on the stand like he did handling the bad guys in the movie. Sad to say the 170 minute movie "The Trial of Billy Jack" was not really about his trial, that lasted no more then ten minutes of screen time, but the suffering of Billy's girlfriend Jean Roberts, Delores Taylor. It was Jean together with some 50 students of her government funded Freedom School who was gunned down by a bunch of trigger happy national guardsmen in a Kent State-like massacre in them being mistaken for being a gang of home grown terrorists and drug crazed, on pot, hippies. Almost the entire film is told in flashback by a crippled Jean in her hospital bed in how a series of tragic events lead to the school massacre that she's a survivor of.
Having been released from prison after serving five years for involuntary manslaughter, the justifiable death of Bernard Rosner, Billy is back in town, or on the Indian reservation, and with a new outlook on life. Going into the mountains to have his soul cleansed of all impurities like violence and revenge Billy hopes to become a true Christ-like pacifist and man of love where his ability and skills of the martial arts would no longer be useful, or beneficial, to him. In that Billy Jack's film success is based on his sh*t kicking abilities not his turn the other cheek pacifism you know that his peaceful and passive outlook on life, as well as his and the Freedom School's enemies, wouldn't last too long!
It's when Jean's students start to expose local as well as national, from the president on down, crooked politicians and their big business supporters with a serious of scorching exposes on the students-run TV station that those who run the country, and our lives, decide to put their foot down; On Jean's and her student's necks. Using a bunch of paid off American Indian leaders to sell their people out, by signing away their land rights, the late Bernard's father Mr. Posner, Riley Hill, who runs to state bank has Jean and her students threatened and harassed at every turn in having their precious Freedom School taken away from them. It's when Posner & Co. try to take over the secrete Indian Land adjutant to the Freedom School, as well as the school itself, that Billy who's been in deep meditation with his both dead as well as live Indian ancestors, as well as his deep inner self, comes on the scene.
It's after a series of minor attacks on Jean and the Freedom school, like the bombing the TV station, that Rosner and his goons decide to go full tilt and finally put an end to the school's activities once and for all. That's In the schools, through a series of scorching exposes, exposing Rosner and his fellow crook's crimes against the Amerian Indians, as well as the American people. Rosner & Co. being totally unsuccessfully in putting Jean and her Freedom School out of business now plans to have the state and federal government do their dirty work for them.
Nowhere as good as the previous Billy Jack movies, "Born Losers" & "Billy Jack", the film "The Trial of Billy Jack" despite it's marathon-like screen time, a world-class marathon runner runs that race faster then the length of the movie, it's not at all boring. What really spoiled the movie for me is that I expected, but knowing better, Billy to throw off his violent past and become a true man of the spirits where violence would be the absolute last thing on his mind. The fact that Billy was so eager to use his fists and feet instead of his spiritual attributes, as a peaceful and environmentally conscious American Indian, made him no better then the violent and mindless brutes that confronted him in the movie!
P.S The movie had Billy Jack at his trial bring out how the infamous Lt. Calley's Mi Lie massacre of some 300 Vietnamese villagers was covered up by the then President of the United States Richard Nixon. The fact is that the Mi Lie massacre happened on March 16, 1968 when at the time Lyndon Johnson, not Nixon, was President.