Once upon a time in the late 1980s, the first time I watched The Exterminator (1980)

Once upon a time, in the late 1980s, I first saw The Exterminator (1980). Actually I had been made aware of the movie much earlier due to advertisements being printed in the Swedish magazine called Scandinavian Film & Video and watching the trailer as it was featured among the previews when you rented movies distributed by VTC. At this point I had in my mind constructed my own personal vision of what the movie was, the question was if it was going to live up to my expectations.
As usual in the late 1980s me and my cousin spent yet another weekend at our grandparents and my grandfather rented the movie for us. The movie had a huge impact on me,  it blew my own personal vision, which I had built up in my fantasy, into fragments. I remember rewatching the prologue which takes place in Vietnam not once or twice but several times in just one weekend. Seldom has a few minutes managed to provide such a horrific and violent glimpse into the hell of war. The pictures I share is of the VHS release that was the first release of The Exterminator that I watched, it was distributed by Video Tape Center Stockholm. Art Nr 8122. It was a re-release, the movie had been released earlier but more on that in a later blog entry.

The fact is that even now, as the years has passed, The Exterminator is still my favorite in the action sub genre labeled Vigilante Movies (violent revenge wreaked upon criminals, quite often by military veterans) As one can expect it is a violent genre that quite often feature rape (there's a genre within the vigilante subgenre labeled rape and revenge which features female victims getting back on the rapists, a good example of his is the notorious I Spit On Your Grave), murder and brutality.
And in this genre we have The Exterminator which manages to get us a glimpse into a hellish, dangerous and corrupt New York in the early 1980s (I really love the setting!!). In this movie we get to see a New York that is no more, We get to see the legendary 42nd street, Bronx, the Meat Packing District, Central Park and so on. We see street crime, we see the mob, drugs and sex trafficking as Eastland takes his own personal war into the streets. One thing that sets The Exterminator apart from the other vigilante movies is that Eastland is so brutal. It´s ultraviolet, gory and sleazy.

If you´re lying I´ll be back...