Konterr Brilliant and touching

Jenna Walter The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Paynbob It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

SimonJack "Hard Target" is one of many Jean-Claude Van Damme films Hollywood calls action-thrillers. One can think of three reasons to watch this film. None have anything to do with great plots or even very good screenplays. Nor do they relate to good acting, or interesting subject matter. The three reasons are the special effects from all the action and carnage, the far out story, and the horrendous characters whom the hero has to fight. This film has all three of those. The five stars I give the film are based mostly on the pyrotechnic special effects and the varied sets. As with most "Vandasy" films, this one starts very slowly and tries to build a case for the hero to have a cause to go after the bad guys. That's usually a drag, because everyone knows the reason for watching the film is all the wild action that will fill that last quarter or third or more of the film. And the usual obvious implausibilities are present in "Hard Target" as well. An army of bad guys guns down Elijah in the middle of a busy New Orleans street. And all the people who ducked for cover when the shooting starts all of a sudden are gone. A whole street in a commercial area is deserted in broad daylight when Randall Poe tries to leave town and Pik blasts him off. All of the bad guys are terrible shots and can't hit the side of a barn. Of course, Van Damme gets lots of exercise in as Chance Boudreaux. He especially hones his gymnastic skills in this one with his running and leaping somersaults, jumps and rings. This film has a usual dose of gruesomeness in some of the killings. But, this is the type of film that one wouldn't label as a possible influence for violent behavior of teens. That's because the fighting and battling scenes are so outlandish and unreal. As with other Van Damme films, this one has lots of fire and fireworks. And really ugly, nasty, bad guys who, one is pleased to know even before it happens, will be rubbed out by Van Damme.

phanthinga How often do you see Van Damme rocking a ridiculous mullet and sucker punch a rattlesnake then bites off it tail ?Chances are small cause he only does all that in Hard Target his best movie in my opinion and directed by John-woo a master of action cinema who bring his own style of action"gun-fu" to Hollywood for the first time ever.This movie is really awesome with all the bullet flying,fire blazing and Van Damme in his prime giving all his strengh to flip over anything that possible while also dual-wielding guns out of a horde of bad guys hunting homeless people for sport lead by Lance Henriksen.The final shoot-out at the abandoned werehouse is my favorite for how over the top it is with the violence and gun-fight

jamariana (1) How much do I like it? 2/5. (2) Direction: 2/5. (3) Is the personal style of the director noticeable? No, 0/1. (4) Editing: 2/3. (5) Plot/Story: 3/5. (6) Quality of dialogue: 1/3. (7) Originality: 1/3. (8) Level of sophistication: 0/2. (9) Is it good writing? No, 0/1. (10) Cleverness: 1/3. (11) Memorability/Uniqueness: 1/3. (12) Quality of the ending: 1/2. (13) Quality of characters: 1/2. (14) Is there character development? Not really, 0/1. (15) Do you root for the lead character? Yes, 1/2. (16) Do you care for the lead character? Yes 1/2. (17) Act structure, conflict/denouement/etc.: 2/4. (18) Acting: 2/5. (19) Chemistry of the leads: 1/1. (20) Cinematography: 2/4. (21) Style/Art Direction/Wardrobe/Make-up & Hair, etc.: 1/3. (22) Emotion/Experience of watching it/Catharsis: 2/5. (23) Atmosphere, i.e. were you sucked into the film? Not really, 0/1. (24) How well made is it?, i.e. effort clause: 2/4. (25) Entertainment value: 3/4. (26) Coolness: 2/2. (27) Would I be OK with dying while watching this? Nah, 0/1. (28) Would I be ashamed to admit I like this? 0/1. (29) Would I rewatch this? No, 0/1. (30) Soundtrack: 1/2. (31) Sound: 1/1. (32) Do I like it of my own free will? I don't like it, 0/1. (33) Is it one of my favourites? No, 0/1. (34) Did something I like happen? 1/3. (35) Would I recommend this to someone? No, 0/1. (36) Truth to the genre, or first of its kind (trailblazer): 1/2. (37) Is it believable? Or Reasonable? 0/1. (38) Overall quality 3/5.Overall score: 41/85, which is 48% and so a 5/10.

Idiot-Deluxe In 1993 Jean-Claude Van Damme was at the peak of his powers and popularity and in August of that year saw the release of his best and most exciting movie: Hard Target. This time Van Damme was directed by veteran Chinese action-film director John Woo - and what a utterly thrilling combination of talents and ability it turned out to be!In his American film debut Woo and Van Damme made a masterpiece of action, ablaze in a fury of gun battles, neck-breaking flying kicks and just overall killer stunt-work. To me, Woo's most important contribution to the picture, is his utterly captivating camera-work and razor-sharp (often complex) film editing. These two qualities place Hard Target far above most other movies of the genre, I'm especially fond of Woo's liberal use of tracking shots (that great moving camera work!) one of his several trademarks. What Woo's cinematography and editing produce is a very vivid and physically visceral film experience. The action scene's are extremely impactful and grandiose, having more snap to them then most films of the genre and the gunplay in this movie is amazingly intense and exciting and, to great effect, they often go overboard in the "squibs and blood-packs department". It's a terrible shame those two talents Van Damme/Woo never worked with each other again - it should have been the starting of a dynasty. Factually speaking, a majority of the fans who are familiar with Jon Woo's American films also agree, that Hard Target (his first) is the best of the lot. I certainly second that notion.The casting, for the most part, is terrific, especially the main baddies: Lance Henriksen as Mr. Fouchon and Arnold Vosloo as Pik, I think Vosloo turns out to be one of the best and most convincing hit-men ever portrayed in film and he's involved in almost all of the gun fights. Yancey Butler in her film debut is only so-so, though it doesn't matter much, because she's completely interchangeable with three of four dozen other actresses of the era - any one of which would have done as good a job or better. The movie takes place in and around New Orleans, several great action sequences make use of the sites of said city, they go all over it as a matter of fact and later on the chase continues into the surrounding bayou and that's when the movie really kicks into full-speed. While meeting Uncle Douvee (thats Wilford Brimley as some kind of crusty old moon-shinin' cajun hermit) along the way, who's a relative of Chance Boudreaux (Van Dammes character), who colorfully enhances the movie. Even some horseback riding action finds it's way into the mix, leading up to an absolutely enthrallingly explosive finale (very stylishly staged Mr. Woo) in an abandoned warehouse. A quick heads-up: Expect to see Lance Henriksen explode across scene in what has to be one of cinema's funniest death scenes. Hard Target is undoubtedly, in grand thundering fashion, the high-point of Van Damme's career - in other words it's his best movie! None of that direct-to-video garbage he's been churning out since the late-90's counts.As many other reviewers have stated before, I just HAVE TO make mention of Van Damme's unbelievably super-awesome MULLET! Wow, now that THING is just beyond awesome, rightfully titled by another reviewer to be "a pantheon-level mullet". In any case it's certainly one of the best (if not the best) movie mullets of all time - Period.Various prints of this spectacularly exciting action film exist, however, UN-like most of the time, it's the Euro-print that is the less edited and more violent print, which..... you might have guessed, is the better print. Up until about 2014 I was only familiar with the somewhat choppy, subdued and >>> !!! NEEDLESSLY EDITED !!! <<< US-version. I'm super-glad to say I own a region-free blu-ray copy of this film, that features the Euro-version, which is definitely the superior presentation. It's the vision that Woo and Van Damme had in mind for the audience all along. As you may already know it was the US ratings-board who were dead-set on bringing John Woo (and his reputation of making hyper-violent movies) to a heel. Which in fact qualifies them as: Meddlesome Morons. I spit on you POS. In the end, 23 years later, time has proved to be very kind to this film and it's definitely still every bit as exciting now as it was then. Hot damn action films were awesome in the early 90's!Oh yah one last point, the SOUND of this movie is fantastic and is just as hard-hitting as the visuals - so crank it to 10!