Review of Hard Target (1993) by Philip D — 04 Feb 2009

If I'm a fanboy for anything, I'm a John Woo fanboy. Juvenile no?

I saw this with a double feature for JCVD. That's a lot of Van Damme. And who boy does swapping Chow Yun Fat for Van Damme make the movie reek of cheese. John Woo should not be allowed to film fist fight scenes. Van Damme's slow motion kicks and punches are super dull, but not as dull as the first half of the movie with people talking, not to mention the brief homophobia and sexism.

Then the good parts! The graveyard scene? Great action (Van Damme isn't even in this part. Yay!) The Mardi-Gras warehouse? Awesome! I even forgot Van Damme has a mullet at this part (note that his mullet isn't really shown on that DVD cover). Van Damme punches a snake to knock it out in this movie Hilarious! The main part is, the script as bad as it is knows how to treat Van Damme. By giving him as few lines and as simple words to say as possible. He's no Chow.

Seeing this in a theatre, a lot of people were dancing when "Born on the Bayou" was playing at the end credits. I had a way too good of time for such a mixed-bag of a movie. Best Van Damme flick. Mediocre John Woo action movie.