Another month.......Another former big screen star takes it up the
'pipe-that-you-wipe' for DTV dollars. After s(h)itting out on last months 'FORCE OF NATURE' (and passing
the batton to Mel Gibson) Bruce
(Friends-And-Family Payments Only, No Notes) Willis returns to the small-screen-arena (not to
mention looking 15 years younger on the poster) with 'HARD KILL'
(Christ, even Seagal would stick a prepositive 'TO' into such generic a
title as this one?)
Jesse Metcalfe plays badass mercenary 'MILLER' ("The Best") who is suffering not only (horribly remdered CGI) flashbacks....but also (what later turn out to be) 'Flash-Forwards' during the opening credits (which is a great way to skimp on the already lo-fi set-pieces and also bump up the running time) Miller (and his team of Dawson Creek rejects battle-hard mercenaries) are hired by Billionaire Tech CEO, Donovan Chalmers (Bruce-Fucking-Willis) to oversee reconnaissance on an old factory that his company wishes to purchase (which despite the location being unspecified, looks oddly Eastern European....but then again, this is an Emmet/Furla production, after all)
(Brucie ponders the Ethiopian-Slim possibility of a 'Whole Eleven Yards' threequel?)
Chalmers needs mercenary bodyguards, because an evil terrorist ("The Best") known only as 'THE PARDONER' has stolen some weapons 'tech' and only the billionaire CEO has the failsafe codes. This piques Millers interest, because he and 'The Pardoner' have rumbled before (resulting in both mental and physical scars for our hero) Miller sets about 'getting-the-gang-back-together' (who despite their hardened backstories, look far too young and cleancut) They also have a terrible team motto of saying 'Whoah-Ahh' in celebration (and repeat it several times throughout the 98 minute running time.....which is odd because there's nothing to celebrate here, folks) At very least, Burt Reynolds 'Raven-Team' had engraved zippo lighters?
('The Pardoner', Terrorist, Martial Artist, 'Forever' Black Ops & Steven Crowder lookalike)
Twenty minutes into the movie, The Heroes (and Bruce Willis) arrive at the unspecified wareware....unaware that 'The Pardoner' is also scouting the building (armed to the teeth with a huge army.....that we only ever see in groups of three) Prompting Chalmers to 'fess-up' about his true intentions of hiring Miller and his mercs. It transpires that the stolen tech is (in fact) an 'Artificial Intelligence' doomsday superweapon, known as 'PROJECT 725'. Chalmers daughter (a fellow boffin) has had her reservations about such a dangerous superweapon, and (briefly) went 'Paty Hearst' with 'The Pardoner'....but is now used as a bargaining chip/hostage to retrieve the failsafe codes from her father. With all the cards (finally) on the table, the stage is set....The mercenaries must take the fight to the terrorists (and retrieve the girl) The problem for the viewer is, can YOU endure another 70 minutes of 'myopic gunfire' in a rundown shithole Romanian warehouse?
(Not exactly the 'Nakatomi Tower')
Review
Some single location 'thrillers' can work.....think Tresspass....or even more recently, Unchained (aka Bullet Head) with Antonio Banderas. Sadly HARD KILL is just as generic as it's title would indicate. The bad guys (despite being touted as super soldiers) are easily taken out by our mercenary heroes (resulting in zero tension or suspense) Perhaps if 'The Pardoner' had dispatched them in groups larger than three at a time, it may have made for more interesting battles. Of course, the bad guys all wear indentical costumes/masks, so only showing them as trios, cuts down on the extras (when you can merely re-use them again) In 2020 however, audiences are wise to such pennypinching, and such cinematic contempt soon leads to mutual disrespect between film-maker and consumer.
Review
Some single location 'thrillers' can work.....think Tresspass....or even more recently, Unchained (aka Bullet Head) with Antonio Banderas. Sadly HARD KILL is just as generic as it's title would indicate. The bad guys (despite being touted as super soldiers) are easily taken out by our mercenary heroes (resulting in zero tension or suspense) Perhaps if 'The Pardoner' had dispatched them in groups larger than three at a time, it may have made for more interesting battles. Of course, the bad guys all wear indentical costumes/masks, so only showing them as trios, cuts down on the extras (when you can merely re-use them again) In 2020 however, audiences are wise to such pennypinching, and such cinematic contempt soon leads to mutual disrespect between film-maker and consumer.
(Forget the guns, Metcalfe....Fire your agent)
But let's get to the only reason we watch dreck like this....Bruce Willis.
But let's get to the only reason we watch dreck like this....Bruce Willis.
The one-time Last Boy Scout gives another tired and uninterested performance here. Having a bald head, also means he's doubled from behind in quite a few scenes, also. His Character is improbably a soldier of fortune cum billionaire tech genius. Early in the movie, he recites out his own list of badass credentials with all the sincerity (and importance) of a grocery list. Yet despite such a backstory, Willis' character is quite literally hidden away (in another room, altogether) from any (and all) action (save two gunshots, that exist solely to give the movie deceptive 'trailer moments' to satisfy it's TWENTY PRODUCERS!!) In true (switch-and-bait) DTV fashion, the ageing, barely glimpsed A-lister still gets the final shot, that (on paper, at least) saves the day.
(This week on 'Louder With Crowder': THIS MOVIE IS SHIT.....CHANGE MY MIND')
Alcohol is of equal importance when embarking on generic fluff like this....so it doesn't hurt to eleviate the bordem and turn this movie into a 'drinking-game' to numb the pain. Take a shot/swig/injection everytime the villian is referred to as "THE PARDONER" or the superweapon as "PROJECT 725" in their full-titled entirity, without any abbreviation or nickname.....and hopefuly you'll be suitably inebriated by the 30 minute mark, giving you the intestinal fortitude required to endure the remaining sixty minutes.
(The aforementioned attrocious 16bit Gamecube-style CGI battle flashbacks)
If you don't have alcohol at hand...you could always do a checklist of the usual cinematic tropes found in Emmett/Furla productions:
Comatose (overpaid & underworked) former A-List star: CHECK
Shithole Eastern European location: CHECK
Overhead drone shots : CHECK
Comatose (overpaid & underworked) former A-List star: CHECK
Shithole Eastern European location: CHECK
Overhead drone shots : CHECK
Pointless flashforwards to bump up Running time: CHECK
Myopic Gunplay: CHECK
Despite the 2020 release date, I can only guess that this was filmed DURING the height of the pandemic (with the threat of death from Covid-19 considered a small mercy for cast and crew) Which *might* (conveniently) explain the limited cast (and likewise locations) were it not for the fact that most Emmett/Furla DTV releases before 'Kung-Flu' were just as woefuly inadequate as this one. And it's the afforementioned 'complacency' that really turns my piss to shit....because these movies whilst completently made, scored and lensed are just insultingly lazy, generic and predictable....and it's a bad sign when the audience realise this DURING the movie (and not afterwards) And HARD KILL follows this depressingly moribund blueprint to a 'T'. Seriously folks, Steven Seagal (however lethargic in work ethic) still puts far more effort into his movies than than Willis (and Co.)
("Whoah-Ahhh...I got them all in czech........slovakia")
So, unless you're a sadistic pervert that enjoys seeing a physically (and likely, mentaly) decrepit Bruce Willis, feather his pension nestegg for the upteenth time (this decade) then there's little much to recommend here (sadly)
Myopic Gunplay: CHECK
Despite the 2020 release date, I can only guess that this was filmed DURING the height of the pandemic (with the threat of death from Covid-19 considered a small mercy for cast and crew) Which *might* (conveniently) explain the limited cast (and likewise locations) were it not for the fact that most Emmett/Furla DTV releases before 'Kung-Flu' were just as woefuly inadequate as this one. And it's the afforementioned 'complacency' that really turns my piss to shit....because these movies whilst completently made, scored and lensed are just insultingly lazy, generic and predictable....and it's a bad sign when the audience realise this DURING the movie (and not afterwards) And HARD KILL follows this depressingly moribund blueprint to a 'T'. Seriously folks, Steven Seagal (however lethargic in work ethic) still puts far more effort into his movies than than Willis (and Co.)
("Whoah-Ahhh...I got them all in czech........slovakia")
So, unless you're a sadistic pervert that enjoys seeing a physically (and likely, mentaly) decrepit Bruce Willis, feather his pension nestegg for the upteenth time (this decade) then there's little much to recommend here (sadly)
