The Visitors (1972)

Bill, Martha and their little child Hal are spending a quiet winter Sunday in their cosy house when they get an unexpected visit from Mike Nickerson and Tony Rodriguez. Mike and Tony are ... See full summary »

Director:

Elia Kazan

Writer:

Chris Kazan (from an original screenplay by)

Stars:

Patrick McVey, Patricia Joyce, James Woods

1 nomination.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Patrick McVey	...	Harry Wayne
Patricia Joyce	...	Martha Wayne
James Woods	...	Bill Schmidt
Steve Railsback	...	Sgt. Mike Nickerson
Chico Martínez	...	Tony Rodriguez

Storyline

Bill, Martha and their little child Hal are spending a quiet winter Sunday in their cosy house when they get an unexpected visit from Mike Nickerson and Tony Rodriguez. Mike and Tony are old acquaintances of Bill; a few years back, in Vietnam, they were in the same platoon. They also became opposed parties in a court martial - for a reason that Bill never explained to Martha. What happened in Vietnam, and what is the reason for the presence of Mike and Tony ?

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Plot Keywords:

past coming back to haunt | girlfriend raped | rape scene | brutal rape | war buddies | 

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Taglines:

Every one wants to turn his back on violence until it knocks at his front door.

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Genres:

Crime | Drama

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

17 May 1972 (France)

Also Known As:

Los visitantes

Filming Locations:

Newton, Connecticut, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$135,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Home Free

Technical Specs

Runtime:

88 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Brian De Palma says on a interview given for the DVD extras of Casualties of War (1989) that the idea from this movie came from the same story that Casualties of War (1989) is based on. The story was published in "The New Yorker" Magazine in 1969, and later became a book. Allegedly Elia Kazan also read the story on The New Yorker and had the idea of a fictional script that showed the after wards of the true history showed in Casualties of War (1989), in which the character played by Sean Penngoes to jail after has been convicted by a martial court of war crimes (he and three outer guys kidnapped, raped and them murdered a Vietnamese girl in the Vietnam war). In the movie, Sean Penn's character, in his trial, promises revenge to Michael J. Foxcharacter, who was the one that reported him.

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Connections

Referenced in The Sinister Saga of Making 'The Stunt Man' (2000)

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Soundtracks

Lute Suite #1
by Johann Sebastian Bach (as J.S. Bach)
Performed by William Matthews, guitar

User Reviews

THE VISITORS (Elia Kazan, 1972) **

Untypical material for Kazan: this curiously amateurish amalgam of ACT OF VIOLENCE (1948) and THE DESPERATE HOURS (1955), updated for the Vietnam era, is unworthy of the director's unquestionable talent (despite being written by his own son!) and emerges as a pointless talking marathon - in which the dialogue is muffled most of the time anyway, because of poor sound recording!

Patricia Joyce comes off best from the hand-picked cast, which includes James Woods' debut role as the wimpish hero(!) and Steve Railsback as one of his two revenge-seeking war buddies; these actors must have thought that they had it made when they were chosen by Award-winning director Kazan (who had, after all, virtually discovered Marlon Brando, James Dean and Warren Beatty) to feature in his next movie but, unfortunately for them, THE VISITORS sank without trace despite being an official entry in that year's Cannes Film Festival!

While the film could easily have turned into a nasty shocker in the vein of THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT (1972) - which might even have been preferable in the long run - the story just meanders on towards a lame and inconclusive ending. At least, the film's snowy setting provides a nice pictorial backdrop...