Hard Target

The streak continues; make it four in row and counting. Hard Target had a lot of good things going for it, chief among them being helmed by John Woo in his western movie making debut. Woo, Hard Boiled and The Killer, is a Hon Kong action movie icon for his use of slow motion and combining gun fights with martial arts. He brings his fight choreography and unique visuals to the table when he teams up with Van Damme. This was a match made in heaven. Though Van Damme did not do a lot of the really hard stuff, which I am sure Woo was not accustomed to, because in Hong Kong the stars do basically everything, they still made it work. This movie is nothing but one really cool action sequence after another. This movie is also a who’s who of “that guy”. Arnold Volsoo, The Mummy and 24, Lance Henriksen, Alien, Yancy Bulter, Witchblade, even Wilford Brimley shows up to do a little sumtin sumtin. What more can you ask for.

The greatness of this movie lies in the fact that Woo thinks of the most ridiculous possible action sequence and them films something twice as ridiculous; kicking someone off a dirt bike while jumping off the back of a car, doing a flip and landing on your feet while stuff explodes behind you, no no surfing on a dirt bike while shooting a gun and leaping off that same dirt bike onto the top of an suv, than rolling off the suv onto the ground and then shooting the suv till it explodes, now that’s an action sequence. That is what you get when you team up Van Damme and Woo, the rest of the alphabet is just frontin.

I could break down every action sequence, but there is no need they are all great. Van Damme uses a lot of his typical cinema martial arts, jumping spinning, etc… but with Woo’s help he adds more gun play to his repertoire. Many of the actions sequences feature a combined use of hand to hand and weapons, most often simultaneously, so he would shoot a guy a couple of times and then finish him off with a round house; great stuff, just great. While Bloodsport and Double Impact out rank Hard Target on the list of great Van Damme flicks, it is not by much.