Pass the Ammo
Pass the Ammo is a 1988 film starring
Bill Paxton,
Annie Potts, and
Tim Curry. The film is a spoof of
televangelism released right after the real-life
Jim Bakker and
Jimmy Swaggart scandals.
Curry is the Rev. Ray Porter, who runs a
Pentecostal faith healing and televangelism empire based in
Arkansas. A small group of stereotypical
rednecks, one of whom was bilked out of her inheritance by Rev. Porter's ministry and another of whom just got out of prison, try to rob Porter's ministry. A series of wrong turns inside the church during the
robbery leads the robbers onstage right in the middle of a broadcast, and the three robbers turn what was supposed to have been "just" a robbery into a
hostage situation. During the hostage negotiations, a series of snowballing scandals involving the ministry come to light. The robbery, hostage taking, and scandal revelations are all broadcast live over sattelite television as locals gather in bars to watch. Rev. Porter and the robbers develop a rapport during the hostage situation that resembles shop talk among thieves, as they discuss the best ways of investing stolen money. One comic subplot involves the Christian network's producer, a drug-addled electronics wizard named Stonewall who decorates his workspace with
Pink Floyd posters, but was hired by the network because "he has found the Lord...he told us so himself." Another subplot involves a local
sheriff, himself also an archetypal redneck whose duck hunting trip was interrupted by the incident, who seems to sympathize with the would-be robbers. The film is partly about his moral struggle in trying to enforce the law when his sympathies lie elsewhere. He just wants to see the situation end with nobody getting hurt, and butts heads with the network's owner and federal agents who demand harsher action. The owner of the sattelite network, whose character is based on
Jerry Falwell, demands that the
National Guard be called in leading to a
siege and climactic ending.
