Boulevard Nights is a 1979 film directed by Michael Pressman.
It is a tale of life in the Chicano neighborhoods of East Los Angeles. Raymond Avila (Richard Yniguez) is a hard-working, ambitious young gearhead, with a good-looking girlfriend named Shady (Marta DuBois) and plans for opening up his own car repair shop. His younger brother Chuco (Danny De La Paz) is however the opposite: insecure, prone to rage. Chuco finds himself falling in with the VGV, the local neighborhood gang, which has a rivalry with another nearby gang from 11th street. Raymond finds himself desperately trying to save Chuco from a life of crime and prison.
Tropes:
- The '70s: The soundtrack, clothes, cars and shooting locations are all 100% authentic 70s East LA. Decades previous to any gentrification, this film gives a fascinating look at the area long before it started becoming an unaffordable A-list destination for some of the country's richest people.
- The Alleged Car: Most of the movie's characters are on the poor side, and if they're not driving a lowrider they most likely have a dilapidated 1950s model rust bucket of sorts.
- Bittersweet Ending: Chuco is dead. But Raymond isn't, and he isn't in prison either, but remains free to build a life with Shady.
- Cool Car: It's a tradition among the youth of the neighborhood. Everybody has hydraulic lifts that raise the chassis of their car off the ground. Raymond has pimped out his car with a custom metal chain steering wheel and a fully upholstered interior. One hilarious scene has him and another man competing to see whose hydraulic lifts can get their car higher.
- Cycle of Revenge: Starts with the VGV gang roughing up an 11th Streeter for spraypainting his graffiti on their territory. Escalates through a brawl with an accidental stabbing, to a car being destroyed, to a VGV mook getting a beating, then to a drive-by shooting and two more murders.
- Down L.A. Drain: Raymond's neighborhood directly abuts the LA "River"; in the opening scene he and a buddy scamper down into the concrete ditch to drink beer. Later, after Chuco gets shot, Raymond takes the car on a wild careening ride through the drain as he races to the hospital.
- Dramatic Gun Cock:
- One when the VGV boys think the enemy is showing up, but it's a false alarm.
- And another right before the 11th Street gangbanger shoots through the window and kills Mama Avila.
- Drugs Are Bad: It's a sure sign that Chuco is going the wrong way when he starts huffing paint with his gang buddies. Raymond is super-pissed when he catches Chuco doing it.
- Fedora of Asskicking: These are popular with the Chicano homeboys, especially Chuco.
- Gangbangers: They are a terrible influence on Chuco. Tragedy results when Chuco's presence in a gang sucks the family into a rivalry with the 11th Street gang.
- Gangland Drive-By: At Raymond's wedding night party, his mother is killed by a bullet fired through the window, meant for Chuco.
- Gun Struggle: Knife Struggle, as Chuco and an 11th Street gangbanger struggle over a knife, which ends up in the other gangbanger's stomach.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Chuco winds up going on his revenge mission against 11th Street all by himself, to save Raymond from involvement. It gets him killed.
- Honor Among Thieves: There actually seems to be some of this between some of the gangsters, as they are shown to have common backgrounds and real camaraderie among them that isn't motivated by money or business. However, the neighbourhoods are extremely balkanized, and regularly brutalize each other over every imaginable perceived slight, such as staring too hard or simply being related to someone involved in a feud. It manifests ultimately as an entirely pointless subculture born of never ending grudges and score settling.
- Insecure Love Interest: Raymond is well aware that Shady isn't a fan of hanging out on the Boulevard with the local troublemakers, which Raymond still kind of enjoys and doesn't intend to fully walk away from. He explicitly says he knows he isn't "good enough" for her, but he's going to try to be anyway.
- It's Personal: Raymond is one of the homeboys, but he's mostly uninterested in the violent aspect of the barrio life. When his mother is inadvertently shot and killed on his wedding night and in his living room, he pretty much says "screw it" and goes all in for vengeance.
- Local Hangout: Not a building but a place, namely Whittier Boulevard in East LA, where cruising the boulevard is an important part of local culture.
- Macho Latino: The movie focuses on the street gang culture in East LA, which is heavily Latino and fueled by alot of toxic masculinity.
- Mexican Standoff: Quite literally, when Chuco is holding a rival at gunpoint and gets guns pointed at himself in return, everyone involved also being Mexican.
- Pimped-Out Car: A staple of the neighbourhood/boulevard culture is the lowrider with hydraulics, which all of the cool guys in this movie have. Raymond especially is all about his.
- Shotguns Are Just Better: Chuco takes a revolver with him when he goes for his revenge, but when an 11th Street gangbanger drops a shotgun, Chuco picks it up, and that's what he uses to kill the bad guy.
- Sleeves Are for Wimps: Probably more than half of the movie's characters wear sleeveless tank tops/undershirts, including females. Several males go shirtless. Chuco wears one to dramatic effect with his new VGV cobra tattoo, making it clear he's a gangster now.
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Spiritual Successor: Colors (1988) to Boulevard Nights (1979). You can see that things did not improve much in LA's gang areas during those 9 years between films. - Tattooed Crook: Chuco's abandonment of peace and his decision to run with violent criminals is solidified when he gets a king cobra tattooed on his arm with the letters VGV, and is shown swaggering down the Boulevard with his homeboys and sporting his new ink.
- Urban Hell Scape: The gang-infested barrios of East LA.
- Wrong Side of the Tracks: Again, East Los Angeles in the 1970s. By US standards, it was truly a slum. Characters hang out in the LA drain getting drunk and scribbling on the wall with spray paint. Buildings, vehicles, clothing and even weapons all appear to be 2nd or 3rd generation hand-me-downs. Overcrowding, poverty, unchecked violence, an engrained culture of gang membership... The protagonists hail from this environment, and struggle with the dilemma of staying true to their roots VS pursuing a more stable, traditional lifestyle elsewhere.
