Bullet to The Head (2012)
Bullet To The Head is a 2012 thriller starring Sylvester Stallone as Jimmy Bobo, a hitman who teams up with a cop to go on a revenge mission after his partner in crime is murdered by Keegan, an ex-mercenary working for a corrupt businessman. It made $4.5 million in its first week, the worst for Stallone in 32 years, and $22.6 million worldwide over its run losing against a budget of $55 million.
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As the film progresses, Detective Taylor Kwon questions Jimmy’s methods but has his life saved by him multiple times, including having a bullet extracted by Bobo’s daughter Lisa. They both kidnap the lawyer of businessman Robert Morel to retrieve a flash drive from him that contains informations about a scheme to replace low-rent housing with luxury apartments, and this is traded for Lisa who has been taken hostage by Morel, who soon ends up dead at the hands of Keegan who is enraged he let her escape.
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The film culminates in an axe battle that is probably my favourite scene, as Bobo and Keegan face off, Jimmy walking away triumphant. He shoots Kwon to make it seem the blame is all on himself for the deaths of Morel’s men, though Taylor refuses to rat on him - yet when he meets him in a bar 6 months later, he warns him to leave his field of work before he’s forced to arrest him.
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This is a film I picked up for free and not one I’ve seen before; I’m mainly familiar with Stallone through the Rocky franchise, and Momoa for Aquaman. It was interesting to see the latter so young in this role, one of his first movies, and I think he gives a decent performance. Sylvester’s characterisation across different movies often gets a bit stagnant and I wasn’t blown away by him in this role. It isn’t the strongest plot however and I didn’t feel any chemistry between him and his daughter either.
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The special features includes a short documentary about the making of Bullet To The Head, including interviews with the director Walter Hill. It definitely doesn’t live up to his other projects like 48hrs, and isn’t something I’d want to watch again.
