Jean-Claude Van Damme, "the Muscles from Brussels," has sought to revitalize his flagging career by working with the most adrenalized directors from Hong Kong action films. His first such effort was this, the umpteenth remake of The Most Dangerous Game, which teamed him with Hong Kong's most fluid action poet, John Woo. Woo does what he can but, as much magic as he injects into the action, he can't turn Van Damme into an actor. Still, this is above-average fare for the wooden Belgian, in which he plays a guy trying to bust a ring of hunters who pay for the right to track and kill human quarry. And Woo has the ever-reliable Lance Henriksen as the chief bad guy, always a plus. --Marshall Fine
Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating: Summary: RAIMI, TAPERT, WOO, VAN DAMME, HENRIKSEN, VOSLOO Comment: HARD TARGET
This is absolutely one of my favorite Van Damme films of all time; I mean come on look at the line up. Jean-Claude Van Damme, Lance Henriksen, Sam Raimi, John Woo, Ted Raimi, and Rob Tapert how could you not like this movie. This movie is a great thrill ride filled with all the action you could want, and great villains, Arnold Vosloo in particular as Van Clef. This has got to be one of Van Damme's best movies he has been apart of.
The story is basically just about some rich guys hunting bums through out the concrete jungle. It turns out that one of the people they hunted had a daughter that is trying to find him, naturally questions arise and that doesn't sit well with them. This is were Van Damme comes in and is hired by the woman to help find her father, what they find is a group of people in a very bad business. From here fights break out, gunshots are heard, and explosions can be seen for miles, what a great movie.
Performance wise this is a great movie as well, Van Damme is excellent in this film and never really gets the credit he deserves as an actor. Of course Yancy Butler as our lead actress is good as well and is very believable in her role. Villain wise is were this film really shines; this movie has two of the best villains ever for a film. First is the brilliant Lance Henriksen playing the lead villain, and as usual he is great and really determined to get what he wants. Which is also the reason why Arnold Vosloo is so extremely good as Van Clef, he is just as cold, vindictive, and evil as Lance but he is the calmer of the two who knows when to walk away. It is the difference between the two that make them such a great on screen team. Also on a side note the ever great Ted Raimi makes a guest appearance on this film, great to see him.
Of course on the production side this film is lined up with all time greats, Raimi, Tapert, and Woo. Of course Sam Raimi and Rob Tapert come through as Executive Producers and hired on the legendary John Woo as the director. Naturally John Woo's style shines through on this film and make it an explosive action packed thrill ride. Of course a lot of credit needs to go to writer Chuck Pfarrer who wrote a great action film that delivers. He did an excellent job with an idea that has been done many times through books and films alike.
Over all this is a great movie for a day off from work, grab the drinks and kick back.
Customer Rating: Summary: Good movie. Comment: This is a very good action movie, however, I don't like the plot (killing the homeless as a game for the rich). I would recommend this for Van Damme fans as well as those that like good action flicks. Customer Rating: Summary: One of my favorite bad movies... Comment: This movie is so bad it's good. Well, it's a mix of good and bad, but I couldn't take it too seriously, and it just made me laugh. I saw it in the theatre when it came out..and I was cracking up the whole time.... The slow-mo actions sequences are great, and Wilford Brimley playing a Cajun guy is the icing on the cake. Gotta love it. Customer Rating: Summary: VanDamme! Comment: If you have cable, you've seen "Hard Target"!
Another predictable, but action packed VanDamme film!
Good stuff! Customer Rating: Summary: "We've got a little game we'd like you to play..." Comment: Plotwise: Emil Fuchon (Lance Henriksen) and Pik Van Cleef (Arnold Vosloo) operate a high-cost game in New Orleans during a citywide police strike: rich individuals pay big bucks to hunt the toughest target of all: man. Combat veterans, reduced to living on the streets, are coerced into participating, all for the client's satisfaction of taking down such a prey. One of these is Douglas Binder (Chuck Pfarrer), whose daughter Natasha (Yancy Butler) soon comes looking for. She hires local dock worker and combat veteran Chance Boudreaux (Jean-Claude Van Damme) to help her out. Of course, Fuchon and Van Cleef would prefer there be no questions asked...
Review: John Woo's first American film is, all in all, the best kind of action film from yesteryear: all-out battles, little to no depth. The plot, the who-knows-how-manyth rehash of "The Most Dangerous Game," has some substance to it, but little character development. While Woo's Hong Kong productions were not of Shakesperian proportions, the characters had depth and personality. Most of the characters here are largely one-dimensional, and stay that way.
But so what? It's an action film, and on that level it more than delivers. The first major action sequence features a large amount of environmental damage- cars get ripped apart, blown up and such- and bullets fly endlessly, more often than not hitting someone in the process. The gunshot noises sound appropriately powerful, as if someone getting shot would take a lot of damage from even a pistol round. This scene sets a standard for the rest of the film, and the final confrontation takes up the last, oh, 15-20 minutes of a roughly 90 minute film. You can guess how epic it gets. Plus, all the Woo staples, like using two guns at once, pigeons and doves flying around, etc. are in abundance.
If for some reason you want to know how it goes as far as acting, you're clearly expecting too much from this film. As uber-insane as Woo can make the action, he can't make Van Damme an actor with depth. Van Damme's flat delivery makes him a relatively lifeless character, and his cocky, all-powerful attitude (as in parts of "Timecop") make him a typical action hero, the unstoppable one. As Fuchon, Lance Henriksen is a villain with class and cunning, although he turns into a raving maniac near the end. Arnold Vosloo is simply the sadistic right-hand man, nothing more, although he gives his character a hint of something else when he isn't smiling maniacally. Yancy Butler is relatively weak in her acting, although you can't expect much when she interacts mostly with Van Damme. A surprise comes from Wilford Brimley, who is hilarious as Van Damme's Cajun uncle.
To sum it up, see it for the action, not the acting.
On a scale of 1 to 10, this film gets a 7.
On a scale of 0.0 to 10.0, this film gets a 7.4.
On a scale of A to F, this film gets a B-.
On a scale of 1 to 5, this film gets a 3 1/2.
On a scale of 1 to 4, this film gets a 3.
Contentwise: Being a Van Damme film and a John Woo film, you'd expect a ton of bone-crunching brawls and billions-of-bullets gunfights, but there is almost none of the former, while the latter makes up roughly 80% of the film. There's nothing particularly graphic, except for when a snake's head is blown apart. There's no sex or nudity of any kind, and the language is brief.
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