If the idea of having it feel like playing a video game and feeling like you’re in control when the main character does it, it‘s not going to be exciting. ‘Cause this is not how you do a POV shooter movie. Basically what Hardcore Henry was trying to be like if Crank, Shoot Em’ Up and The Raid movies were thrown together in a blender, then it turned out to be a disgusting milkshake of an action movie that makes little sense when watching.
Having the entire movie shot in point of view might sound like a good idea, but it gets old after like 15 minutes. The camera kept rolling trying to make you interested following along on this ride, but it falls apart in the span of two hours. The biggest issue is this story is so convoluted to where it doesn’t matter who lives or who dies. And the characters are useless given no development. But who cares? We’re here to see one person kill bad guys. Henry kicks ass, so what? He’s basically invincible with no realization except save his wife.
The villain is over-the-top who somehow with no reason given as telekinetic powers? It never explained why. Who should’ve been great was Sharlto Copley (District 9, Chappie). He plays a barrage of characters helping Henry out, but he’s so annoying plus at first you don’t understand why he keeps coming back and it’ll make sense later on, until then it’s pointless. If it didn’t get any worse, the violence became nauseating. There are so many bloody sequences that it makes Django Unchained look like a playhouse. Levels go from crazy to ridiculous in under a minute wanting to say, “What in the world did I just witnessed?” Almost seems like a horror movie. The action is non-stop to where you don’t even get to breathe to take it all in.
So many of the sequences are so ridiculous and it makes you wonder if this is supposed it be campy or use our brains to figure it out for ourselves. This is meant for video game players and its director Ilya Naishuller’s greatest feat at directing action fails.
Hardcore Henry‘s gimmick of POV throughout may seem impressive, but it instead reduces to headaches and bad excessive cartoon violence.
Grade: D
DC's Take 