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Hops and Box Office Flops: ‘STRIKING DISTANCE’
Jagoff Cops Striking Distance is a fairly stereotypical 90s cop movie, but with a twist: Bruce Willis’ hairline! From scene to scene it shifts dramatically. Balding Bruce, which we must assume is the Bruce from the original shooting, transforms into toupee Bruce multiple times throughout the movie—sometimes from one cut to the next. It’s astounding. The wig—despite its omnipresence—is not the hook of the film, though. Striking Distance follows the downward trajectory of former homicide detective Tom Hardy. He’s now a river rescue cop. Why? Well, he sold out his partner, and was shunned by the other boys in blue. Ok, but what’s the rest of the movie about? Oh, there’s also a…
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Hops and Box Office Flops: ‘LAST MAN STANDING’
No, Not the Tim Allen Show Last Man Standing is the American reimagining of Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo (1961), though it wasn’t the first reinterpretation. The Spaghetti Western A Fist Full of Dollars (1964) had tread this ground before—a man with no name caught up in the exacerbating violence of warring gangs. Unlike the Italian-produced film, Last Man Standing was given Kurosawa’s blessing. Unfortunately, it can’t replicate either of its predecessors results. Directed by Walter Hill, it’s a movie that struggles mightily to present a coherent story. Sure, it revolves around Irish and Italian mobsters vying for bootlegging dominance in a remote Texas town, but what happens around that is often nonsensical. That is no fault of the…
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Hops and Box Office Flops: ‘HUDSON HAWK’
Scat Burglar Hudson Hawk is as bold a movie as an A-list star could possibly choose to make. And that’s a compliment. Bruce Willis, most famous for playing gruff cop John McClane, stars as cat burglar Eddie Hawkins—the titular Hudson Hawk. He’s tasked with stealing artifacts crafted by Leonardo da Vinci that are capable of turning lead into gold. On the surface, that sounds like a fairly standard action-centric plot. What it actually entails is anything but. Hudson Hawk boasts a deluge of slapstick tomfoolery; dynamic duets between Willis and Danny Aielo, who plays his partner Tommy Five-Tone; a secret com device crafted out of a crucifix; and a gaggle of candy-themed thugs—one…
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Hops and Box Office Flops: ‘A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD’
A Good Day to Davai Die Hard is arguably the greatest action movie ever made. A Good Day to Die Hard, on the other hand, is a soulless husk that’s related to the prior entries in name only. Certainly, the character of John McClane, Bruce Willis, became progressively more absurd with each sequel. He’d gone from isolated cop, surviving on instinct and guile, to literally a super human battling a fighter jet on a highway. In A Good Day to Die Hard, that trend continues. Worse, though, there’s just no story or a compelling villain to balance it out. The plot of this movie makes no sense—not even a semblance of it. It’s so…