Film: The Hunted (1995)
Jul. 15th, 2024 11:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annavereAs the news has managed to hit seemingly every flavor of depressing lately, even the cultural stuff I mostly stick to for my sanity's sake, last night I told D to turn it all off and went looking for a trashy film to watch from our small cache of DVDs. Picked The Hunted, a generically titled action mash up (swords, guns, hand to hand, poisoned shuriken...) from 1995 starring Christopher Lambert (as an American), John Lone and Joan Chen (both as Japanese characters). Written and directed by J.F. Lawton, most famous for the screenplay of Pretty Woman, which I have never seen. Samurai vs ninja, with confused businessman Lambert wandering around Japan being more of a macguffin than a protagonist.
Was it a good film? No. But it promised to be exactly what we needed and delivered. In addition to its trashy plot, it served a keen fannish interest for me by blending (possibly even intentionally) the worlds of Highlander and Twin Peaks. I doubt anyone's heard of this film or cares, but spoilered opinions below.
Joan Chen is the instant attraction, picking up Lambert for a night on the town and watery lovemaking. She wears a red dress, is plastered all over the DVD case, and was clearly a huge selling point of the film, so I was deeply annoyed when Lone's evil ninja appears ten minutes into the runtime and fridges her. She then reappears in vaguely mystic visions afterwards, including one rather neat visual effect where she appears in full color against the washed out palette of Lambert's hospital room. If something remotely artistic is happening with the camerawork, it's usually because Joan Chen is on screen, again making her lack of screentime annoying.
Meanwhile, Evil Ninja is named Kinjo. He kills with a sword. His feud with the Samurai Guy goes back hundreds of years (it's a family feud, or so they claim). Ahem.
Kinjo is possibly the worst ninja I have ever seen. His idea of stealth is a small army (okay...) who pass unnoticed through the crowd in innocuous disguise (perfectly ninja, will grant) and upon learning their target's general location proceed to slaughter everybody in the vicinity. Three times over. In a hospital, on a bullet train and on the samurai island. This is part of their super sneaky plan to leave no witnesses ever. Imagine the paperwork, and the nightly news. The sad faces of the tourism board.
There's a metric ton of dead people by the end of this film.
When killing Joan Chen, Kinjo also brings two other ninjas with him, because it's hard to kill an unarmed woman with a sword and he needs moral support. The ninja cult also completely fail to locate Lambert when he goes on the run, as it's eventually revealed that the samurai guy leaks his location multiple times to try and lure Kinjo out. It's hard for a ninja cult to make it in the modern world. A brother's gotta help them out.
Seriously, the samurai guy is a total son of a bitch. He wants to fight Kinjo "honorably" and therefore gets crowds of people killed in the crossfire, and also disarms Lambert when he tries to sensibly shoot Kinjo. Truly a prince among men. His wife is nicer, and has archery skills. I liked her and wish the film had been about her and the ghost of Joan Chen working to bring down the cult, with assistance from Lambert.
Oh, and the murder of Joan Chen which kickstarts everything? Has exactly nothing to do with either the cult or the feud, and is a spectacularly unrelated subplot.
I will say, I think Lambert, Lone and Chen all did a totally respectable job. Lone got the brunt of bad script, but when he wasn't being crippled by that, he acquitted himself well. I won't even with the cultural aspects of this film, but I suspect they're suspect.
Anyway, Lambert ends up getting some training on the samurai island, with its nameless cannon fodder trainees (who all die at the end) and drunken comic relief swordsmith (of course he survives). Karate Kid montage ensues. Lambert keeps handling swords with a delightfully perplexed expression, as though wondering why they feel so familiar. He only has a gun on the DVD cover, probably to avoid confusing the audience about which franchise this is.
The samurai ninja throwdown happens, Lambert sits most of it out, and Joan Chen briefly shields the injured samurai's wife (now widow) with her own image, causing Kinjo a moment of guilt and confusion, staying his hand long enough for Lambert to finally show up. I appreciated that detail.
Also, Kinjo won't stay dead when Lambert defeats him... until Lambert finally loses patience and decapitates Kinjo. Just saying.
I checked to see if anyone has made any Highlander/Twin Peaks crossovers, and as far as I can tell, none exist. I don't think this film actually works as a template for one, but... the freed ghost of Josie Packard? Connor's Immortality and attendant memories stolen by the Black Lodge? I feel there's something workable here.
Was it a good film? No. But it promised to be exactly what we needed and delivered. In addition to its trashy plot, it served a keen fannish interest for me by blending (possibly even intentionally) the worlds of Highlander and Twin Peaks. I doubt anyone's heard of this film or cares, but spoilered opinions below.
Joan Chen is the instant attraction, picking up Lambert for a night on the town and watery lovemaking. She wears a red dress, is plastered all over the DVD case, and was clearly a huge selling point of the film, so I was deeply annoyed when Lone's evil ninja appears ten minutes into the runtime and fridges her. She then reappears in vaguely mystic visions afterwards, including one rather neat visual effect where she appears in full color against the washed out palette of Lambert's hospital room. If something remotely artistic is happening with the camerawork, it's usually because Joan Chen is on screen, again making her lack of screentime annoying.
Meanwhile, Evil Ninja is named Kinjo. He kills with a sword. His feud with the Samurai Guy goes back hundreds of years (it's a family feud, or so they claim). Ahem.
Kinjo is possibly the worst ninja I have ever seen. His idea of stealth is a small army (okay...) who pass unnoticed through the crowd in innocuous disguise (perfectly ninja, will grant) and upon learning their target's general location proceed to slaughter everybody in the vicinity. Three times over. In a hospital, on a bullet train and on the samurai island. This is part of their super sneaky plan to leave no witnesses ever. Imagine the paperwork, and the nightly news. The sad faces of the tourism board.
There's a metric ton of dead people by the end of this film.
When killing Joan Chen, Kinjo also brings two other ninjas with him, because it's hard to kill an unarmed woman with a sword and he needs moral support. The ninja cult also completely fail to locate Lambert when he goes on the run, as it's eventually revealed that the samurai guy leaks his location multiple times to try and lure Kinjo out. It's hard for a ninja cult to make it in the modern world. A brother's gotta help them out.
Seriously, the samurai guy is a total son of a bitch. He wants to fight Kinjo "honorably" and therefore gets crowds of people killed in the crossfire, and also disarms Lambert when he tries to sensibly shoot Kinjo. Truly a prince among men. His wife is nicer, and has archery skills. I liked her and wish the film had been about her and the ghost of Joan Chen working to bring down the cult, with assistance from Lambert.
Oh, and the murder of Joan Chen which kickstarts everything? Has exactly nothing to do with either the cult or the feud, and is a spectacularly unrelated subplot.
I will say, I think Lambert, Lone and Chen all did a totally respectable job. Lone got the brunt of bad script, but when he wasn't being crippled by that, he acquitted himself well. I won't even with the cultural aspects of this film, but I suspect they're suspect.
Anyway, Lambert ends up getting some training on the samurai island, with its nameless cannon fodder trainees (who all die at the end) and drunken comic relief swordsmith (of course he survives). Karate Kid montage ensues. Lambert keeps handling swords with a delightfully perplexed expression, as though wondering why they feel so familiar. He only has a gun on the DVD cover, probably to avoid confusing the audience about which franchise this is.
The samurai ninja throwdown happens, Lambert sits most of it out, and Joan Chen briefly shields the injured samurai's wife (now widow) with her own image, causing Kinjo a moment of guilt and confusion, staying his hand long enough for Lambert to finally show up. I appreciated that detail.
Also, Kinjo won't stay dead when Lambert defeats him... until Lambert finally loses patience and decapitates Kinjo. Just saying.
I checked to see if anyone has made any Highlander/Twin Peaks crossovers, and as far as I can tell, none exist. I don't think this film actually works as a template for one, but... the freed ghost of Josie Packard? Connor's Immortality and attendant memories stolen by the Black Lodge? I feel there's something workable here.
