William Smith in THE LOSERS cont.
The Losers is more a biker movie than a war movie.  Like many other biker movies [e.g. Angel's Die Hard]  The Losers has disparate elements which humanize the bikers, show them as spirited rebels and (at least to 90's yuppie sensibilities) also present some repellent qualities. We find it hard to identify with characters like Speed who prominantly display swastikas.  And in an argument with Davis, Link makes a nice speech about his five years in lockup being the result of wanting to breath free air on a motorcycle and having long hair and an earring.  However, he doesn't deny Davis' reminder that he was guilty of raping young girls.

The bikers refuse to be safeguarded.  They break away from the convoy, taking off for town, risking Viet Cong ambush

Bill did his own "clowning around" bike stunts but left  jumping the bike over buildings to the stuntmen.

Bill shows his gentle side by letting a kid ride along on his bike.

Dirty Denny spends most of his time whoring

Sweet Limpy meets a hooker with a baby (Capt. Jackson's as it turns out) & insists on bringing them along to the base camp.

Duke finds his Vietnamese girl & doesn't seem perturbed that she won't leave for the U.S. until she says goodby to her Viet Cong brother.

Director Jack Starrett was delightfully unrecognizable in the uncredited part of Chet Davis, the creepy CIA operative they rescued.

According to William Smith, in the original script the bikers were to survive while Davis was killed.  [See our Interview with Bill.]  We're actually glad it didn't happen that way.  Bill's death while he's chasing Davis is one of his most esthetic.