When Grindhouse was released in 2007, one aspect of it that really stuck with people was the fake trailers sprinkled throughout the movie. These advertisements for non-existent exploitation movies were so well-received that fans began clamoring for them to become real movies. Robert Rodriguez did just that with his Machete trailer last year, making it the first to go from fake trailer to real movie. But it's now not the only one. The second was a recently released Canadian-based production called Hobo With A Shotgun.
Hobo With A Shotgun began as a fake trailer created by a trio of filmmakers from Nova Scotia. It won a contest organized by Robert Rodriguez at the "South by Southwest" festival in 2007, being rewarded with an inclusion in some Canadian theatrical screenings of Grindhouse and status as one of the bonus features on Grindhouse's Blu-ray release. A few years would pass, but the trailer's creators culled together the necessary financing to expand Hobo With A Shotgun into a feature film. They even somehow managed to get Rutger Hauer of all people to play the title role. And let me tell you the honest facts: the movie is awesome.
As the movie begins, we're introduced to a nameless hobo (Rutger Hauer) as he catches a ride on a freight train. He eventually arrives in Hope Town, a lawless city overrun by crime and iniquity. The streets are plagued with senseless violence, pimps selling underage hookers, pedophiles dressed as Santa Claus, and people making their own versions of the Bumfights videos. The ringleader for the whole thing is Drake (Brian Downey), a mobster who runs a criminal empire with his sons Slick (Gregory Smith) and Ivan (Nick Bateman). Thanks to their efforts, every lowlife in Hope City is running wild while innocent people are too afraid to stand up for themselves.
But the hobo is gonna change things. He stops Slick from kidnapping a young prostitute named Abby (Molly Dunsworth) and hauls him to the police station. But he's rebuffed by the cops — all of whom are corrupt — and is beaten to a bloody, mangled pulp. After spending the night recovering at a grateful Abby's apartment, the hobo's luck gets worse when he finds himself caught up in a robbery at a pawn shop. Unwilling to let it slide, the hobo takes a shotgun from one of the shop's displays and kills the thieves. He pays for the shotgun and begins using it to wipe out every crook in the city. The ensuing war between the hobo and Hope City's criminal element causes chaos in the streets and ultimately leads to a showdown between the hobo and Drake.
I can't even begin to properly describe just how awesome Hobo With A Shotgun is. From the moment it begins to when the closing credits roll, the movie is nonstop fun. It's like they rolled everything about '70s and '80s vigilante movies that kicked ass and lumped them together into one exciting 96-minute package. It's so badass, in fact, that I'll tell you to stop reading this review right now so you can go out and pick up a copy of it. Do it. Now. Seriously, I'm not joking.
Okay, if you're still here, I might as well go through my usual routine. The movie was directed by Jason Eisener, who brings a lot of style to the show. His enthusiasm for the project shows, as Eisener brings a tremendous energy to it. It feels just like one of those old vigilante movies, and the fact that it doesn't take itself seriously makes it more entertaining. My only problem is that it appears almost too colorful. Maybe it's because of how new the movie is and the fact that I watched it on Blu-ray, but I missed the old-fashioned gritty look of those movies Hobo With A Shotgun was paying tribute to. If I'd watched a faded print of it on some worn-out VHS tape that I'd rented from a mom-and-pop video store, it probably would have looked more true to the movies it was striving to be like.
John Davies contributes the screenplay, which I thought was really great. Davies goes through pretty much all the tropes and clichés you'd expect, playing them in such a way that it makes all of them a lot of fun. And his use of cheesy dialogue and one-liners ("Put the knife away, kid, or I'll use it to cut welfare checks from your rotten skin.") adds an element of unfettered silliness.
Never once does Davies try writing anything other than a sleazy exploitation movie. While Machete bogged itself down with its pro-immigration allegory, Hobo With A Shotgun has nothing to say. It merely wishes to cram itself with as much insanity as possible. And besides, when you've got a movie where hookers use a man as a piñata and a bus full of schoolchildren are burned alive by the villains, there's not really much room for any sort of social commentary. Where would you fit it in?
Let's move along to the cast, who I really liked. Molly Dunsworth is sweet and charming as the movie's resident "hooker with a heart of gold," playing the role with a lot of amiable warmth. Our villains, on the other hand, are unbelievably outrageous. Gregory Smith and Nick Bateman are incredibly over the top, while Brian Downey chews the scenery with such ferocity that I can practically hear his overacting coming from the DVD case as we speak. There's no way to take Smith, Bateman, or Downey seriously, but isn't that the point of the whole movie?
But one cannot speak of Hobo With A Shotgun without mentioning its star. Rutger Hauer has been in the acting game for forty years, but this movie almost seems like the one he was born for. He plays the titular hobo with a fiery zeal that makes him frightening at times, yet he also adds a sympathetic tenderness in certain places throughout the movie. Hauer is absolutely perfect here, and the movie is stronger for his presence.
Hobo With A Shotgun was legitimately some of the most fun watching a movie I've had in a while. The movie has no qualms with doing something crazy in order to get a reaction out of its audience. But there aren't enough good things I can say about it. Hobo With A Shotgun is a movie worth seeing if you love low-budget action movies from the '70s, or awesome things in general. So on my typical scale, the movie gets four stars and a proud recommendation from yours truly. And remember: when life gives you razorblades, make a baseball bat covered in razorblades.
Final Rating: ****
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