Hard Target starts
with a poor homeless man being bowhunted through the
grungy night streets of New Orleans. His ostensible
pursuer is a big-game hunter looking for the ultimate
thrill, but the real danger is severe businessman Fouchon
and his right-hand man Van Cleaf, the entrepeneurs who
organize these hunting excursions and place their trackers
and vehicles at the call of the hunter. There seems
to be some kind of statement, or at least intentional
impression, that the natty and cultured Fouchon is
overcivilized to the point that he'd dissociated from the
"earthy" human values and only comes close to
touching them through his involvement in these exercises.
Whatever your interpretation, the single scene of Fouchon
violently playing a breakneck piano piece with mechanical
perfection and an impression of controlled rage is the
kind of touch you don't get in most action pieces.
Natalie Binder, daughter of the recently slaughtered man,
comes to the Big Easy wondering why letters from er daddy
recently stopped. After finding that Dad had
recently lost his job and his room in a boarding house,
she starts checking the shelters and soup missions,
stupidly flashing her pocketful of traveling cash among
down-and-outers. In the real world, she would quickly have
been the victim of their mugging; but in this world, a
tarnished knight appears: Chance Boudreaux (Van Damme),
ex-Marine turned seaman who just happened to be in the
neighborhood, and who always enjoys exercising his high
kicks for a good cause.
It's no more
than a chance meeting, and wouldn't develop into more than
that, but when Natalie then heads to the police station to
file a missing persons report, the only detective on duty
during an officer's strike informs her (quite rightly)
that for a person to be missing, he has to have someplace
to be missing from. Her only alternative is to canvass the
missions and such herself, in the company of someone who
knows the city well. Like, maybe an out-of-work kickboxing
ex-Marine.
Finding dad's
abandoned shopping cart of worldly goods, they find a
stack of phonesex fliers that many of the homeless pass
out for spare change, and boy, what a lucky first clue --
because seedy porn purveyor Randal Poe just happens
to be Fauchon's recruiter, finding homeless veterans with
combat experience and no family to be contestants in
Fauchon's little contest. Obviously, Poe screwed up on the
"no family" part with Binder, much to the
consternation of Fauchon and Van Cleaf, as Chance, with
Natalie in tow, tracks them down.
Part of what
makes this movie memorable is the setting; New Orleans
comes across like a once-classy town gone hopelessly
shabby, trying to shake off a decades-long hangover; and
the soundtrack, heavy on the blues and zydeco themes,
plays this up flawlessly. Unfortunately, the final act
moves the action from the peeling grime of the Quarter to
the hinterlands of Louisiana, Chance's old stomping ground,
to get the assistance of his moonshining Uncle Douvee.
It's that old trick of getting the hunters out of their
comfort zone, but since the countryside isn't exciting
enough, we naturally find an abandoned refinery out in the
middle of nowhere for the showdown -- filled not only with
sheet metal, hanging chains and catwalks, but also used as
a graveyard for old Mardi Gras floats. Sure, Mardi Gras is
a big part of New Orleans culture, but since the New
Orleans we've already been watching for well over an hour
isn't at all festive or colorful, it's more of a break in
imagery than a connection. In fact, the oversized and
garish papier-mache constructions are more like the
cliffhanger of an old Batman episode.
There is,
however, plenty of übermacho gun fu in the finale, plenty
of stuff blows up, and Natalie naturally ends up being the
designated hostage. Of course Chance safes her.
In many countries, the Hard Target DVD and video had a
special version. In the original movie was to much
violence so the movie was re-cut. What's so extreme about
Hard Target? Here's the list:
|
Sex / Nudity:
|
A picture of a naked woman on a
handbill advertising phone sex. Some cleavage, and
muscular Van Damme finds a reason to show off in a
tank-top.
|
|
Violence/ Gore: |
The extreme violence is hyperbolic
but credible nevertheless. Many people are killed in
innovative ways: by arrows, fire, bullets of various
calibre, hand grenades and Van Damme's kicks. A man's arm
is twisted back and broken. A man's earlobe is cut off
with scissors (we hear his screams and see the bloody
result). A man is shot in the eye through his door's peep
hole. A man is shot in the head and his brains end up all
over the windshield of his car. A rattlesnake bites a man
on the face. And, a man is shot in the crotch, repeatedly.
|
|
Profanity:
|
12 F-words and several other profanities and
insults.
|
|
