Five the Hard Way

I saw this movie as featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000, under the title "The Sidehackers." I'm used to these bad movies having lots of different titles (Heck the alternate titles to Plan 9 make more sense than the real one), but "Five The Hard Way"? That doesn't even come up in the movie. That makes it sound like it's a card game.

The Sidehackers is a much better title for this dreadful movie, cause it features the ultra-underground sport known as "sidehacking" (or as I call it sidehackin' with an apostrophe, much cooler that way). A sidehack, or uh yeah I guess that's what you'd call it, is a motorcycle with a sidecar. The sidecar is actually just a platform with a bar so a person (Unlucky and no doubt highly stupid) can stand on this thing and lean left and right in the turns to "balance the car out." You could have also tried just getting rid of the sidecar altogether. But hey then I guess there'd be no title, and they'd have to call it something ridiculous like Five The Hard Way.

Eventually these wacky racers get embroiled in a plot that involves murder, revenge, and idiocy. Basically it's a downer, and by the end most of the characters are dead (In this film, the more sympathetic you are the likely you are to get offed). I'm not sure what I was supposed to take out of the film, except maybe that good doesn't always win, or maybe that ESPN's X Games have a lot more to answer for than I thought.

I would not watch this movie again without the help of the MST3K crew. It's pretty terrible, and after the first couple of racing scenes, isn't the least bit cheesy (Dumb throughout, but not cheesy), and it's really a bit of a downer. That and the hat the main character Rommel (You know a character's in trouble when he's named after half of the rant the Hamburgler shouts) is absolutely ridiculous. I hope I get one for my birthday this year.

I say that the only way to watch this film is the MST 3000 version of it. I wouldn't say that it ranks #1 on my bad film-o-meter (THAT honor goes to Manos: The Hands of Fate), but it's bad.

The biggest yawnfest are the racing sequences. Are those guys foolproof, or did they just edit out all of the crashes?

The subplot isn't that great either. I'd describe it, but I want you to see how bad this film is for yourself, preferably the MST3K version. Everyone loves Joel, The Gumball Man (Tom), and Bird Beaked Boy (Crow)!

1/5 stars *

I've seen almost all the bad movie classics. Most of the classics of bad cinema are bad because of low production values, bad acting and silly plots. No such luck here. The production values are adequate for the subject matter and the plot is fairly standard. Unfortunately, these are the things that make the classics entertaining.

What we're left with is a meandering script with a very standard plot, bad acting, and worst of all, incompetent direction. The movie is filled with long sequences, such as the sidehacking race from which it gets one of its titles, that add nothing to the plot or characters that couldn't have been accomplished in one tenth the time.

If that weren't enough, what little plot is stuck between these sequences is either difficult to follow or just doesn't make sense. For instance, at one point a character is killed and it took me a while to figure it out. Not that it was supposed to be a secret, the point just wasn't conveyed the way it was apparently intended. And throughout the whole movie, up to and including the end, I couldn't understand why the characters were doing the things they were doing. In the few places I did understand, I didn't get why they were going about it the way they were.

In short, this movie is incredibly bad, and not in any fun way. It's quite probably the worst movie I've ever seen. I would not recommend this to anyone for a straight viewing. The only way anyone will get any fun out of it is by ripping into it with friends or letting the professionals do it for them via the excellent MST3K treatment, which is available on DVD.

It has been more than 45 years since I was first ambushed by Sidehackers at our local drive-in theater while also attempting better living through chemistry (reference a Jimi Hendrix tune for specifics). Still, after all these years, I cannot pass up the chance to write a review of the worst movie ever made. I am now not a young man, mind you. I've seen hundreds, perhaps a thousand movies. None comes close to Sidehackers (as it was titled when I saw it). Senseless, disgusting violence. You got it. Misogyny, check. Zero redeeming social value. Absolutely. If you must watch this gawdawful monstrosity, I recommend only the Mystery Science Theatre 3000 version. And even Tom Servo and Crow can't make this worth your time. You'll feel better eating pistachio shells or pulling out hang nails. Trust me.

This film is brutal, boring and just plain cheesy. It's technically two movies smashed together, the first is the entire "sidehacking" bit and the second is a murder story where Rommel's girlfriend is graphicly killed and he has to get back at J.C. someplace in the mountains with some other guys, including, a drunken hillbilly who tells bad jokes such as "Number 8!" And the ending makes no sense at all. The title "Five the Hard Way" doesn't seem to make sense to those who never heard of the song therefore labeling it dated. The alternate title of this film is "The Sidehackers" even though "sidehacking" is only seen in the first five minutes.

Avoid this stinker at all costs, unless of course, it's the Mystery Science Theater 3000 variation, which is one of the funniest episodes.