Hard Cash

So bad it's actually quite good fun says it all really. Some of the scenes could actually be from a spoof movie. If you accept it's not going to be a great (or even good) film, it is OK - good for late on the weekend after a few beers.

You do have to wonder how Kilmer and Slater, though admittedly hardly at the peak of their careers, got involved in this. Either the script never got read, or both actors have no scruples when it comes to making a fast buck - it certainly won't have done anybodys career prospects any good. I hope they were well paid because I can't believe this film made any money.

Crack another beer, relax, and laugh, (or cry). Don't say I didn't warn you...

Hard cash or Run for the Money which i believe was the USA title, is basically another one last heist movie. Christian Slater is the leader of his crew and after being busted for a botched robbery is released from prison looking to make one last score. He encounters problems when the money that is ripped off is FBI money and is then coerced by bad FBI agent Cornell played by Val KIlmer to pull one more heist job for him. The movie is pretty predictable, the action scenes are basically low budget and painfully fake when it comes to the actor's scenes and the script was pretty average. It's dissapointing that a cast with Val Kilmer, Christian Slater, Darryl Hannah, and Bookeem Woodbine ended up in such a dissapointing movie, with that cast and a decent movie this is easily box office, but when you see it you see why it was a tv movie that would've been straight video.

The film wasn't much good but what got me really distracted was Sofia (Bulgaria) trying to look like New York. Another sign that there was not much money to back this project (otherwise they would have at least tried Toronto). Of course it doesn't look as NY at all, for the whole movie I was trying to guess where in the world it was filmed (I guessed rightly that it was in Europe). Slater and Hannah definitely deserve something better than this cliché' full of scenes already seen in other not so great films. Certainly they aren't the best actors around but their and others' performances are what keeps together this lame attempt of a film.

With a cast including Christian Slater and Val Kilmer, you might expect this to be a humdinger of a caper, but unfortunately, that isn't the case. The script was poorly written and the director seemed unable to decide how serious to take it all...the actors mostly floundered about without a clue. As a fan of both actors, I was most disappointed with this effort.

One of the most senseless, poorly executed and forgettable pieces of trash I have seen this century. Even though Val Kilmer and Christian Slater have done their fare share of clinkers, they've generally been in more good than bad films, so I have no idea how much money or other leverage was used to make them both sign on to this shoddy bit of an action-crime dramedy.

The camera work is not bad though, with very passable and sometimes quite colorful cinematography (you've never seen life as New Jersey trailer trash look so pretty). But the plot is completely unbelieveable and ridiculously executed with downright embarassing scripting, dialogue, editing and pacing.

As for character development, the only person I had any sympathy for was a cameo: Jose, the poor Mexican wetback who had a halfway funny scene selling oranges about mid-way through the film. I never felt sorry for Slater's character and his threatened daughter, the main protangonist and innocent of the film, because the plot was so completely wonky with unbelievable twists. I could of personally improved this picture 200% with about 10 pages of very doable suggestions, scene reorderings, dialogue changes and other cosmetics.

Do what the director and producers should of done with this thing before it was ever released or put to video, and run for the incinerator and burn it!

Val and Christian, shame on you for lending your names to this thing!!