[IMDB link] [Netflix link — bit they don’t actually have it! Yet…] [Wikipedia link] [Fansite link – includes soundtrack]
A cult classic from 1990 — I managed to pick up some German DVD of this, which is quite the rare item. It may or may not be a legit release. It’s long been out of print. It has an interview not included with the VHS, but the menus look like something some script kiddie made. This release unfortunately seems to have been cropped to 4:3 (1.333:1 fullscreen), even though Netflix lists it as 1.85:1 (i.e. properly widescreen). But maybe Netflix is wrong. I’ll have to check my VHS recording someday. Apparently it IS coming out on BluRay and on dvd (R2) in June of 2009.
LIMERICK REVIEW: There once was a stoner artist named Jill.
Whose boyfriend brought home a robot made to kill.
The sculpting montage was fun;
But soon she was on the run.
It turned out to be part of the population control bill.
HAIKU REVIEW: Never drop acid
when trying to save your friend
from killer robots.
PEOPLE: The first of two major feature films directed by South African filmmaker Richard Stanley… Though he has done other lower budget films, documentary films, and full-length music films for the band Marillion. He was interviewed in 2007: http://notcoming.com/features/richard-stanley-interview/ and in 1997: http://www.horschamp.qc.ca/offscreen/Stanley.html.
Starring hottie Stacey Travis (Ghost World, Traffic, Earth Girls Are Easy, “The Wink” Seinfeld episode, Intolerable Cruelty), her boyfriend Dylan McDermott (The Practice, Party Monster, Jersey Girl, and Hamburger Hill [my first date movie!]), Irish actor John Lynch as his friend Shades. And William Hootkins (The Island Of Dr. Moreau, Superman 4, Radiers Of The Lost Ark, and “Red Six” in Star Wars [!]) as the ultra-creepy voyeur “Link”.
With small cameos by Lenny, leader of Motorhead, Iggy Pop as a voice-only radio announcer (“And the good news is… There is nooo fucking good news!”), and Carl McCoy, singer of Fields Of The Nephilim, as The Nomad.
VISUALS: Flipping through TV channels in post-apocalyptic movies is always strange. Remember the “future TV” in THX-1138 that became the opening sample for Nine Inch Nail’s Mr. Self Destruct? TV in this movie is equally disturbing, containing clips from GWAR, Einsturzende Neubauten’s 1/2 Mensch, and clips reminiscent of (but NOT from) Testuo The Iron Man.
An incredible triumph of style over substance! Not that there is no substance — there is. But style seems to take a definite forefront to substance in this movie. The music, the lightning, the computers (which are reminiscent of the computers in Max Headroom:20 Minutes Into The Future, or the movie Brazil), the camera angles, the flickring lights, the fractal hallucinogen shots — are all great triumphs of style in this movie.
Movies this cyberpunk fit pretty squarely in with today’s goth culture. I could see this being played on a screen at a goth club, and people standing around it in complete motionlessness.
QUIRKS: A society with legal drugs. Jill smokes “Happy” cigarettes — legal marijuana. Shades drops acid before the conflit starts, and is tripping during the entire movie. (“That’s some serious.. fuck ’ems!”) You don’t see alcohol anywhere. Just the pot and LSD.
Originally given an X rating, though this is totally undeserved.
Based on a 2000 AD comic short story called SHOK! Walter’s Robo-Tale — which was apparently only 7 pages long.
Quite politically relevant, even in today’s standards. Nuclear war. Population control. Global poverty. Your typical cyberpunk elements.
Won the 1991 Avoriaz Fantastic Film Festival award for best special effects, the Brussels International Festival Of Fantasy 1991 Silver Raven award, and the Fantasporto 1991 International Fantasy Film Award for Best Director (and nomination for Best Film).
SOUNDTRACK: Soundtrack includes “Stigmata” by Ministry. This is possibly the best use of a heavy industrial song in any movie ever, and it’s pretty much one of my favorite Ministry songs ever. They play GWAR on a TV while the song is playing, too! This is more or less my favorite music montage of any movie ever. A frickin’ inredible song played while using a blowtorch to create an amazing piece of art situated around a robotic head. You can actually download the entire soundtrack at the fansite HERE.
The closing credits is “The Order Of Death” by P.I.L. (with Johnny Rotton of the Sex Pistols) — “This is what you want; This is what you get.” repeated over and over.
It also includes “The Ace Of Spades” by Motorhead (played in the movie by Lemmy, using a cassette player in the taxi he is driving), and 2 Iggy Pop songs.
It’s also interestingly scored by Simon Boswell, with strange synth music that gives it a very unique feel.
POLITICS: The government is not always acting in your best interest. Population control has been on their agenda for some time — since before the inception of this movie. As we move closer to running out of resources due to over-population, the population control agenda will inevitably grow. We may someday be considered collateral damage in a war on ourselves — a war to make sure our resources don’t run out.
BAD STUFF: Not a high-budget movie. The effects look pretty 1990. Not many characters, either. And it’s hard to find. Many people who saw this in the theatres in 1990 walked out. Many hated this. But I’ve never found a soul who’s ever watched it and not loved it. 50% of people rate it 7 or higher on IMDB. Nonetheless, there are those who hate this film. Whether you are one of them is a matter of taste.
CONCLUSION: Rated only 5.4 on IMDB (though 50% of people rate it 7 or higher).
I give it a 9/10 on IMDB and 5/5 stars on Netflix. This should be part of the cyberpunk film bible, of such a thing existed.
RECOMMENDATION: I think anyone given opportunity to see this should take said opportunity, and am willing to loan out my VHS or DVD to friends.
SIMILAR MOVIES/SHOWS: Blade Runner. Max Headroom:20 Minutes Into The Future. The Terminator. Even Robocop and the movie Brazil have similar aspects.
Here’s hoping Hardware 2 gets produced someday! Maybe the blu-ray release will stir up some interest? Unfortunately, the fact that the intellectual property rights are split between multiple entities is yet another way in which intellectual “property” laws have deprived us of the very art they were meant to protect.
MOVIE QUOTE: “Oh we all walk the Wibberly-Wobberly walk.
And we all talk the Wibberly-Wobberly talk.
And all we all wear Wibberly-Wobberly ties.
And we look at all the pretty girls with Wibberly-Wobberly eyes.”
(The situation that this quote comes from is WAY creepier than it sounds. WAY creepier. Imagine someone watching you for months, then they come into your house while you’re being attacked and start singing this.)
“No flesh shall be spared.”
-Mark 13, The Holy Bible
FRIENDS’ RATINGS: I assume Dan loved this movie because I think it was him that introduced me to it. Samantha J also loves it. And Dave O and Dirk must too, because when I tweeted about it, they posted quotes from the movie. :) Apparently more people were into this than I remember!
Mood: meh
Music: Tiamat – Evilized
June 3, 2009 at 8:26 AM
I’m definitely a fan… even though I didn’t see it until it hit cable.
I still have a big wall poster of it rolled up somewhere (now probably slightly water damaged, unfortunately).
The film is bleak. I love that. Cyberpunk tragedy. And definitely some good style.
Looking forward to it being on DVD… and up on my shelf, finally. :)
June 25, 2009 at 1:02 PM
I would probably pay for that poster! unless it’s damaged.. :)
November 7, 2009 at 7:30 PM
Note to self: Don’t ask Kier for the poster. He’s already said no.
June 3, 2009 at 12:45 PM
Here’s the leading lady on Seinfeld, as a blonde:
http://www.megavideo.com/?v=NLO0IA4Q
(go to 6min in)
September 14, 2009 at 6:44 PM
Also – check out the non-workprint version of Richard Stanley’s movie Dust Devil. I can’t vouch for the movie, having only seen the workprint versoin which I thought sucked, buuut:
Richard Stanley talks about Hardware for several minutes during the DVD extra.
Including talking about how Sinead O’Connor was supposed to be the taxi driver, but dropped out the day before. So they got Lemmy from Motorhead to do it, in exchange for a bottle of Jack Daniels he drank before he even got there.
He was so excited to have a gun as a prop that he accidentally threw it in the river. The divers they had on hand couldn’t find it…
Also, it was supposed to be even more violent than it was. The black kid who got shot was supposed to meet a much more violent demise. The dwarf was also supposed to have his head caught on fire then go through an industrial shredding machine that folded him in half. They had automatic fake kicking dwarf legs made up and everything, but never got to use ’em.
June 3, 2009 at 1:06 PM
I may have to borrow this sometime. I may have seen this a long time ago, but over 1000 movies later, I don’t really remember it.
It’s June, but Netflix still shows no release date.
June 30, 2009 at 12:08 PM
It’s definitely out. Doesn’t necessarily mean Netflix has it.
June 3, 2009 at 9:55 PM
hardware was a great movie. that watkins dude was also in DEATH MACHINE , of which, the uncut version is really great. another cyberpunk movie :) it sounds like you havent seen it, or forgot about it? its pretty similar to this movie, plus its got brad douriff!!!
simon boswell also did the soundtrack (well, the few composed songs) for ‘Hackers’. it can be construde as a cyberpunk movie… hey i like it, even tho its very unrealistic.
June 4, 2009 at 8:23 AM
I haven’t even *heard* of Death Machine, Copmn. Or Brad Douriff :)
Hackers was good. I wouldn’t quite consider it canonical cyberpunk because it still took place in today’s society, more or less. But yes: It’s good, even though it’s very unrealistic.
June 4, 2009 at 8:30 AM
I see Brad Douriff == Chucky. Weird.
June 25, 2009 at 12:55 PM
I remember this movie playing in a few theatres in the ATL, but never got out to see it. When it first came on cable, a friend of mine had taped it since I did not have cable. His angle was simply.. dude, it has Gwar in it. It blew me away. At the time, I was just in high school and was not looking into the deeper facts of political views or anything like that. The way it looked, the way it was shot, the emotional involvement, it was all there. Now, I never owned it on VHS, but I had special ordered it on Laserdisc. I was told it was widescreen, but it was 1.33:1. Just because it has a ratio does not necessarily mean it is widescreen. Either way, I still enjoyed this crystal clear copy of this movie at the time. I still look for that Region 1 copy on DVD or Blu-Ray, but for now, I hold on to my iPod copy that was cropped wide… very badly.
I will say of all my friends, most sat through it, but only a few actually enjoyed the movie. It is not for everyone. Being in visual effects and actually seeing how they went practical and it worked very well, I truly appreciate everything that went into the movie. This is a classic that can hold it’s own up against the likes of Robocop.
June 25, 2009 at 1:02 PM
“Dude, it has Gwar in it” is a completely acceptable angle!! Even if it was Ministry on the audio, and Gwar on the video!
August 6, 2009 at 7:02 PM
hardware is a divinative example of how our
planet will ended up due to hazzardous waste
chemicles that is thrown on landfils that can
escape in to the ozone lair if we do not start
recyle more instead of producing the increase
of landfill that is distroying our planet and
film focuses on how to recyle wate and putting
to use by making artpieces that i s made from
industrial waste like old parts of plastic dolls
and etc and richard stanleys vision proves the
statment that is what is happening to earth
with the sensaciable performances from dylan
mcdermott and stacy travis as the kimono waring
heroine jill and haedwars rating 20/10.
frankie smales
(hardware fan)
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