Fighting Back (1982)

Interesting facts

Fighting Back is a 1982 vigilante action thriller film written by Thomas Hedley Jr and David Zelag Goodman and directed by Lewis Teague. The film stars Tom Skerritt, Patti LuPone, Michael Sarrazin, Yaphet Kotto, David Rasche, Lewis Van Bergen, Earle Hyman, and Ted Ross.

Production

The film was rumored to be based on the story of Anthony Imperiale, a former city councilman in Newark, New Jersey, who organised a vigilante group. The producer, Dino De Laurentiis, had enjoyed a big box office success with an earlier vigilante movie, Death Wish. He developed the film with one director but two weeks before filming started replaced him with Lewis Teague.

Teague wanted to make a film about a "flawed hero: I’d always imagined a Raging Bull type of story, with this fascinating villain as the main character.’ However De Laurentiis pushed for scenes showing the lead to be heroic, so Teague said, "the picture’s a little schizophrenic in its point of view — you don’t know whether to like the guy or detest the guy."

Fighting Back was mostly filmed in and around the Kensington section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania over seven weeks starting in November 1981. It was known during filming as The Last Safe Place and then Striking Back. In February 1982 it was announced Paramount had acquired the film.

Patti Lupone later said "I don't know what to say about the experience except that I respected my costars and my director, I had a lot of fun making it and I play a harried Italian housewife."

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