Tuesday, March 15, 2016
First-Person Action Movie Hardcore Henry Is a Great Idea That Might Make You Sick
kotaku.com: Hardcore Henry is the dream of 1990s video games come to life. It’s a movie that fully realizes some video game makers’ horny pursuit of the hyperreal, only to invert that desire with viscerally cartoonish results. In this action movie, the real world operates on video game logic. You’ll probably wish you had a gamepad in your hands, along with a barf bag.
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While watching Deadpool with my sister, I saw the trailer for Hardcore Henry, and was instantly enthralled, having seen the youtube video it was based on and the initial teaser footage. My sister, a 23-year-old who works with kids, was less enthused. When a film is literally 90 minutes of straight action, with no time to breath, there are going to be people that will be turned off. A similar thing happened with Mad Max last year, since so much of that movie was action scenes, some people I have watched it with found it to be tiring as opposed to exciting. I think that from a craft perspective, though, nothing like Hardcore Henry has ever been made, and I'll see it just for the novelty of a whole film shot in first person. This also has interesting implications of the relationship between the main character and the audience, since in this case, you are, for all intents and purposes, the main character. Through a smart writing trick, Henry's speech chip is malfunctioning, and so he can't speak, which makes him the perfect stand in for the audience. If nothing else, the movie should be fun for middle-aged men trapped in loveless marriages and dead end jobs who like living vicariously through action heroes.
I am fully aware of the fact that I am not the target demographic for this movie: I don't play a lot of first-person shooters, action movies in general aren't my thing, and some parts of Deadpool were too violent for me to even watch. With that in mind, I can't comprehend watching just five minutes of this movie if you paid me. The violence, obvious lack of a good plot, and overall concept don't appeal to me in the slightest. I just don't understand why anyone would pay to sit in a theater and watch someone else play an FPS-- which is basically what it sounds like watching the movie is like. I do completely understand the newness of the concept and the technological breakthroughs the movie represents, and I think there is something to be said for the novelty of the filming style. However, I just don't see why this movie would make money. It seems like watching a Let's Play but without the indulgent self-branding commentary. I do think one interesting thing about this concept is the point it makes-- whether it means to or not-- about violence in video games. I think there will probably be a lot of stimulating dialogue about the extent of allowable video game violence as a result of this movie, since it takes it out of the virtual world and shows the audience what that actually looks like when done to real people.
I am fully aware of the fact that I am not the target demographic for this movie: I don't play a lot of first-person shooters, action movies in general aren't my thing, and some parts of Deadpool were too violent for me to even watch. With that in mind, I can't comprehend watching just five minutes of this movie if you paid me. The violence, obvious lack of a good plot, and overall concept don't appeal to me in the slightest. I just don't understand why anyone would pay to sit in a theater and watch someone else play an FPS-- which is basically what it sounds like watching the movie is like. I do completely understand the newness of the concept and the technological breakthroughs the movie represents, and I think there is something to be said for the novelty of the filming style. However, I just don't see why this movie would make money. It seems like watching a Let's Play but without the indulgent self-branding commentary. I do think one interesting thing about this concept is the point it makes-- whether it means to or not-- about violence in video games. I think there will probably be a lot of stimulating dialogue about the extent of allowable video game violence as a result of this movie, since it takes it out of the virtual world and shows the audience what that actually looks like when done to real people.
I am a huge action movie fan. But, only when they have some sort of value other than just action, like great cinematography, a cool story, maybe some lovable character, or diversity or maybe a female lead. Like John Wick was beautifully made, Bruce Lee movies have sheer talent, the Transporter movies are fun with Jason Statham. But movies that lack these things like say, any Michael Bay movie make me want to leave the theater, with endless action and terribly outdated sexism, etc. Hardcore Henry seems like another one of those, yet it's only claim to fame is its filmed all with a suped up GoPro. No thank you. I was watching that and I thought to my "Can you imagine seeing that in IMAX". I know 100% that I would vomit. Also, I agree with the article. The whole comentary of it all seems a little outdated. With game companies like TellTale Games constantly putting out new amazing narrative content, games like this aren't all that revered anymore. And it seems like this movie won't come off as poking fun at them, since the people who will love this movie, 14 year old boys will view it as a cool homage to their favorite games. Maybe if the message was something else. About the direction games can go in. Perhaps if they switched from FPS to third person part way through or had a sequence where, since he has multiple incarnations, was a girl. but that's just me. the way it is, I probably won't see it.
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