While waiting outside court (I was set to try a divorce case), I received a call from actor Raymond J. Barry. You see, I had emailed him through his website concerning a very good little film called Recoil. The film was featured at the Dahlonega International Film Festival in June.

     My cell phone rings at the oddest times with real opportunity--take it, run with it, write about it.

     Of course, I gushed immediately about Mr. Barry's terrific performance that is the centerpiece of Recoil. Barry plays Killian, a Vietnam veteran whose Vietnamese wife has died and daughter has become estranged from him. Killian is an alcoholic attempting to find his way straight but is confounded by depression and addiction. Barry's incarnation as Killian is uncanny, intense and perfectly believable. You've seen people like Killian before and you feel sorry for them. Killian's essential likeability is only faintly hidden by his depression.

     "I feel Jarek has a voice and something that I trust, moral integrity," Barry was talking to me about the director of Recoil, Jarek Kupsc. "Jarek just called me up out of the blue and said that he had a film. He said he couldn't pay me but I read the script and I wanted to do this. I just did it for nothing because I wanted to do it."

     Raymond J. Barry is someone you have seen before, a familiar face in film. You might remember him as Tom Cruise's father in Oliver Stone's Born on the Fourth of July, or as Earl Delacroix in Dead Man Walking. I remembered him from that cool flick Year of the Dragon. You might remember Year; it was directed by Michael Cimino (The Deer Hunter). Man, I wanted to ask Barry about Cimino, but my focus was on Recoil.

     Barry had high praise for director, writer, star Kupsc (who plays Gopo in the film), telling me that "it was unusual because I became friends with Jarek and that doesn't happen easily."

     The character of Killian had personal meaning for Barry, who told me that by focusing on the "post-traumatic stress associated with the aftereffects of war [both Killian and Gopo suffer post-traumatic stress], I realized that I had grown up in a violent and alcoholic environment. War is unpredictable, you don't know what might happen from one moment to the next. Same thing with alcoholism; it might be a smashed lamp, or a car wreck or whatever."

     Barry continued, "what I liked about Recoil was that it shows how a person can get over the hump and move on with life and possibly have a good life, not be a victim, but use free will."

     Recoil is unique in that it blends the stories of two war veterans: Gopo, a veteran from the recent Balkan conflict and Killian, an American Vietnam veteran. According to Kupsc, "[n]ot many people realize...that the actual number of American casualties [from the Vietnam war] is still rising." Kupsc cites that "about 200 thousand more veterans of Vietnam have lost their lives." These veterans, according to Kupsc, have "killed themselves."

     Kupsc asserts that many veterans slip "into the abyss of the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). A few of the afflicted are strong enough to seek help, but fewer still find the cure. To most of them, suicide offers the only solace."

     The production budget for Recoil was $45.000, with crew and talent salaries deferred. The movie was produced under the SAG Experimental Film Agreement. Watch for Recoil at a film festival and, hopefully, in a theater near you.

Jonathan W. Hickman