A group of Vietnam veterans are discharged in an anonymous town. Four of them - Danny (Joe Don Baker), Shooter (Paul Koslo), Fatback (Elliott Street) and Kid (Alan Vint) decide to buy a car and drive cross county to California where they hope to go into cattle farming on some land owned by the Kid. On the drive they are met by a combination of ignorance, contempt and hostility that eventually culminates in a violent, bloody conflagration in a small back roads town. "Welcome Home, Soldier Boys" is a downbeat, existential anti-war film, that is part road movie, part exploitation shocker. It is sullen and morose from beginning to end with the majority of the film given over to long brooding takes and the melancholic and bitter exchanges between the veterans and those they meet on the road. This approach makes the final 15 violent and extraordinary minutes even more brutal and shocking. Richard Compton's directorial approach is a sombre as the Guerdon Trueblood's introverted screenplay, with the downer approach "enhanced" further by a series of melancholic country songs by Country Gazette. The acting is naturalistic with most of the camaraderie, frustration and growing resentment of the embittered foursome delivered with clever non-verbal touches. "Welcome Home, Soldier Boys" is a shocking, brutal and mournful look at war and its aftermath and how the horrors of combat seep into the very soul. ( )