Directed by Kathryn Bigelow and Monty Montgomery • 1981 • United States
Starring Willem Dafoe, Robert Gordon, Marin Kanter

The first feature by both acclaimed director Kathryn Bigelow and future David Lynch producer Monty Montgomery, as well as the screen debut of star Willem Dafoe, this edgy, should-be cult classic puts a furiously subversive spin on the rebel biker films of the 1950s. Dafoe is the pomade-slicked, leather-clad Vance, whose outlaw motorcycle gang roars into a small Southern town en route to the Daytona races, igniting simmering tensions with the locals and setting the stage for a violent standoff. The air of all-American menace is heightened by the jukebox soundtrack courtesy of costar and neo-rockabilly legend Robert Gordon.