Hard to Kill (1990)

I must be honest, I am nervously regretting some of the credit that I gave Steven Seagal in Above the Law two years ago because I fear that may grow to repeat himself.  I liked Seagal in that movie as a sort of interesting blend of pacifist blend of new age martial arts instructor and unstoppable killing machine – the kind of guy who talks to you about your inner spirit and then breaks the necks of fourteen well-dressed hitmen without ever changing his expression.  It was kind of neat, but I’m getting the impression that this will become his schtick.

Above the Law was an interesting gritty cop thriller, but his follow-up Hard to Kill doesn’t aim that high.  Here he plays Mason Storm, a cop whose family is wiped out after our hero crosses a city official and spends seven years in a coma under the name John Doe.  When he wakes up, he immediately finds that hitmen are coming to finish the job.

Therein lies the rest of the movie.  With his nurse at his side, played by sexy Kelly LeBrock, he mercilessly breaks the arms, legs and necks of faceless goons who burst in to take him out.  This is the kind of movie in which gunfire and murder can take place for 20 minutes and the female bystander can only smile a sexy smile when she should be paralyzed with fear.

The movie’s trek is simply that, just a lot of kick fights with faceless goons until Mason reaches his target and beds down with his female co-star.  Sadly, we have to sit through more of the former than the latter.  Now THAT is a miscarriage of justice.