It's a sad day for us here at the FCU my
friends. Yes, we have known for a while that the
singular character badass action flick was dying, because the
current demographic, as it were, is far more interested in
sparkly vampires, gay pirates, effeminate boy sorcerers and
Nicholas Sparks movies. Action movies really only peak
the interest in this demographic if the hero is dressed in
some form of tights or shiny metal. 'Bond' is a timeless
franchise so it kind of doesn't count but 'Taken' did surprise
while 'Taken 2' took us back down. Nonetheless the
demographic likes what they like, and we're good with
that. What choice do we have? But our hope was
with 'Bullet to the Head', starring an ancient but still
ripped Sly Stallone and directed by veteran action director
Walter Hill… maybe the stupid action movie has a chance.
Maybe the current demographic will wake up and see that
watching one bad dude kill a lot of worst dudes is still
viable. Alas… no. Apparently an episode of 'Glee'
or 'Smash' or 'Idol' must've been running because 'Bullet to
the Head' got sprayed with Demographic Repellent before it got
released to theaters because you people stayed away from this
one like it had the cooties. And it's sad because
'Bullet to the Head' is about as perfect as a dumb ass action
movie can get. It's over. I hear taps playing in
the background.
Sly narrates as hitman Jimmy Bobo, and when we catch up with
Jimmy, he and his partner Louis (John Seda) just whacked some
dude, as the job required. There was a prostitute in the
house but once Jimmy saw the tattoo on her back he decided to
let her live. Just now I figured out he let her live
because the tattoo was one of the designs of his daughter Lisa
(Sarah Shahi), meaning I guess Jimmy doesn't kill anybody his
daughter has inked. I guess. Hopefully her parlor
isn't that popular in New Orleans or Jimmy won't be doing too
much more killing. Unfortunately, after this murder gig,
somebody sent a hitter to hit the hitters in the completely
ruthless and oversized Mr. Keegan (Jason Momoa). Louis
didn't make it, Jimmy did, and now Jimmy is not a happy
man.
Turns out this guy they killed was a dirty
D.C. cop which introduces us to D.C. cop Taylor Kwon (Sun
Kang) who jets down N.O. to investigate. He puts a few
things together, deduces Jimmy had something to do with hit,
but all he wants is the info this dirty cop stole with his
hope being that the hitman and the righteous cop can work
together. It's a pretty stupid plan but Taylor Kwon is a
pretty stupid character. I mean Taylor comes to town,
talks to the N.O.P.D, and almost immediately a pair of
N.O.P.D's finest try to kill his ass, until of course Jimmy
saves him. But yet he still maintains contact with the
N.O.P.D., telling them his every move. See what I mean?
Now Jimmy and Taylor become action movie buddies, Jimmy
shooting people in the head and Taylor whining about how he
shouldn't be doing that. The reason Jimmy and his
partner where deemed expendable has something to do with some
super evil developer (Adewale Akinnouye-Agbaje) and his lawyer
(Christian Slater) paying off senators for zoning rights or
something. Pretty standard evil developer stuff.
Of course, one could surmise that at this time in New Orleans
that there is probably thousands upon thousands of miles of
acreage available for little or no cost and moving people out
of housing developments via paying off U.S. senators would be
just plain stupid, but you know how evil land developers
are. We also get acquainted with Jimmy's beautiful
daughter, and of course we all know you don't put a woman who
looks like that in a movie like this unless this damsel finds
herself in some serious distress. Ugly chicks, for
whatever reason, rarely find themselves in distress in these
types of movies. Possibly because ugly chicks don't
exist in these kinds of movies.
Ultimately, after a bunch more bullets to the head, chests and
other orifices… not to mention the explosions, distressed
damsels, car crashes and whatnot, we know that one extra
large, extremely oppressive Samoan looking dude will be doing
battle with a much smaller, much older, albeit cut like stone
Italian looking dude. And they will be doing this with
axes. C'mon now… does that have all kinds of awesome
written all over it or what?
True enough, 'Bullet to the Head' is no bedrock of
lucidity. An evil land developer? Really?
That's best we could do? A cop partnering with a hired
killer who doesn't want him to kill anybody? The lunacy
of killing the killers because you don't want them to talk,
because we all know hitmen sing like birds when
cornered. They didn't even know why they killed the guy
or who hired them, so what are they gonna to sing about?
A whole city where every single cop is dirty? All of
them? Where we actually had to import an honest
cop? The love between this honest cop and the hot tattoo
artist, even though they spent all of 35 seconds alone
together? And lastly, the pure insanity of insulting a
hired killer, a man who is clearly insane and our bad guy
fully acknowledges that this cat is clearly insane, then
looking surprised when this lunatic turns on you after you
insulted him. How our bad guy managed to climb up the
criminal ladder making bad decisions such as this is beyond
me.
But are these issues with this movie? Of course
not. This is the way these things are supposed to
go. Where a punch to the chest sounds like an explosion
of thunder, where one can walk through town and blow up stuff
and the cops never respond, and where we attend a swank, high
brow dinner party and there are naked women walking around for
absolutely no reason. And director Walter Hill gives us
all of that in addition to keeping his movie moving on rails
going downhill, and delivering a title to the uncaring masses
that is true to its name.
But it's not 1986 anymore people, a time when the mere sight
of a sparkly vampire would've gotten you beatup. 'Bullet
to the Head' delivers completely on what it promises, and
therein lays its biggest flaw. Out of date, out of time,
out of touch, but completely outstanding. My heart
breaks.
