tMC Review: Bullet to the Head

Directed by: Walter Hill

Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Sung Kang, Sarah Shahi, Jason Momoa, Christian Slater,  Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje

"Bullet to the Head" gives you exactly what the title promises… and plenty of them bullets!  No, I did not say "Bullet in the Head," the 1990 Hong Kong crime drama by John Woo.  This film is based on a French graphic novel about a pair of hit men who are hired to do a job and then are set up to be killed.  In this film, the surviving hit man James Bonomo (Stallone), winds up with an overzealous detective Taylor Kwon (Sung Kang), trying to get information from him about felons who murdered his partner.  Taylor ends up being his only friend, something James never saw coming, mainly because the same people want to end them both after already killing their partners.  It is now up to them to find out who is on their side, who isn’t and decide whether or not they can trust each other like they did their cohorts… and oh yeah, try to unveil the criminal malfeasance and weed out the brain trust.

“Bullet to the Head” was directed by Walter Hill who directed another buddy flick you may know called “48 Hours”.  Hill absolutely knows how to get the exact chemistry between his two leads that is needed.  His methodology really works, having these men throw one liners at each other the entire time and start to see each other not as just a cop and not just a criminal, but someone they can not only count on, but lean on.  You begin to hope one of the titles bullets doesn’t have their names on it… because you buy it.  You believe the bromance. 

Okay.  Stallone clearly uses the film to show he still has “it”, whatever it is he used to have.  (The tag line is “Revenge Never Gets Old” for a reason).  The film worked, mostly because he’s right.  He does still have it and we enjoy watching it!  You’re pulled in, as if by an invisible beam, thinking to yourself as you see photos of Stallone in various stages of life fly by, "I hope he proves that just because you age, it doesn’t mean you can’t still be an action star… be it."  You root for him and by the end of the film, you had a good time... and are now more optimistic that whatever it is you've been meaning to do your whole life can still be done!  

Do you completely buy that he could lay upon Jason Momoa the sort of damage that is brought on him?  No.  Perhaps a different opponent would have been the way to go, but not unlike a good cage fighting event, it was fun to pick your favorite.