Arrow Round up: Hired To Kill (Nico Mastorakis, 1990)

Hitting shelves soon as part of Arrow’s inexplicable campaign to revive the work of VHS-era Greek exploitation kingpin Nico Mastorakis (whose 1986 film ‘The Edge of Terror’ aka ‘The Wind’ we covered here a while back as a VHS Purgatory post), ‘Hired To Kill’s forthcoming release reminded me that I have actually owned the film on DVD for years and never got around to watching it -- until now, that is.

Purchased as part of a “10 DVDs for £10” deal from a local junk shop if I recall correctly, my copy of the film bears the seal of Hollywood DVD – celebrated suppliers of Godfrey Ho ninja movies to Poundland stores across the nation – and, at the time, my rationale for dropping 50p on it probably didn’t extend much beyond “Oliver Reed? SOLD!”, to be honest.

(Further proof, as if it were needed, that whatever inflated pay-packets independent movie producers might dish out to contemptuous, washed up legends to ensure their cooperation in creatively bankrupt genre vehicles, it’ll be worth it in the long run as long as goons like me are still buying the tickets.)

Anyway, as it transpires, ‘Hired To Kill’ is a head-spinningly goofy sub-Cannon action flick starring a charisma-free muscle dude named Brian Thompson, who perhaps ever so slightly resembles a very young Lee Marvin if you squint, but basically spends the bulk of his screen time looking like he just got thrown off the university rugby team for banging his head against the locker-room wall too many times.(1)

Thompson plays a mercenary hired by sleazy uber-capitalist George Kennedy to take down Oliver Reed, who is the tyrannical ruler of some ill-defined rogue nation. This will allow their local power-to-the-people resistance movement (headed by a barely-in-this-movie-at-all Jose Ferrer) to take charge, ready for Kennedy and his shady CIA-backed cohorts to sweep in and exploit the hell out of everybody. Or something.

From this agreeably cynical starting point, things swiftly descend (ascend?) into la-la land when it is explained that security in Reed’s dictatorship is so tight that there is only one possible plan that will get Thompson inside. That of course being that he will pose as a famous fashion photographer, recruiting a dirty half-dozen of beautiful female fighters (a women’s prison boxing champion, a duplicitous Mossad agent, a mute girl who bloodily dispatched the soldiers who murdered her family – you get the idea) to serve as his “models”, thus allowing them to infiltrate the highest echelons of wherever-the-hell-it-is society and to pad out the middle half hour of the movie with gratuitous Andy Sidaris style swimsuit footage until such a point as it is deemed prudent for the girls to change back into their khakis and go all “paintballing weekend” for the inevitable closing reel of exploding barns and low flying helicopters. Splendid.

You might be thinking that seems like a fairly unlikely means by which to effect a coup d'état in a military dictatorship, but look here – George Kennedy says his experts have looked at ALL the possibilities, and this is the ONLY ONE that will work - so you can shut up.

(Let the record state that ‘Doin’ It For The Money’, the sleazed up, sub-Prince electro-pop number that accompanies all of the fashion shoot / pool loungin’ sequences, is a minor masterwork.)

At this point, we should probably address the confusion regarding where this film is actually supposed to be set. Although the text on the back of the DVD box refers to “a volatile Mid East nation”, in practice it looks an awful lot like a quiet Greek island, and all references to the country’s name or location are pointedly avoided during the first half of the film… until that is, Mastorakis suddenly drops the pretense and has his characters begin referring to it as – uh – “CYPRA”. Subtle, Nico.

No one however seems to have communicated any of this to Oliver Reed, who turns up to the party as a full-on South American ‘El Presidente’ type figure, complete with a mangled Hispanic accent, a red star peaked cap and a truly magnificent moustache.

Happily though, Ollie is a lot more engaged and enthusiastic here than he was in many of his latter-day “descent into cheque-collecting ignominy” appearances, probably due to Mastorakis’s wise decision to place his character in a lot of scenarios that the old boy presumably quite enjoyed – shouting at people whilst waving a machine gun around, quaffing wine at a dinner table surrounded by glamorous ladies, and, in one intensely uncomfortable sequence, holding forth about the artistic qualities of his own love-making whilst groping a woman’s breasts from behind.

The latter scene, it should be noted, occurs shortly before Thompson – whose fashion designer cover story requires him to undertake the least convincing impression of a homosexual ever seen on screen – kisses Reed full on the mouth, in a sequence you can guarantee never reached take # 2. Whilst I would generally tend toward the opinion that you’d have to be out of your mind to buy ‘Hired To Kill’ for full price on blu-ray, the chance to see Reed’s subsequent reaction shot in HD should be worth the entry price alone.

If, reading this, you’re thinking ‘Hired To Kill’ sounds like a dose of pure trash movie nirvana, well, to a certain extent you’re not wrong. The dialogue and line delivery alone are enough to potentially make this the stuff of snarky Youtube legend, and, if you do the decent thing and wait until the point in the evening when you’ve reached the end of a six pack before hitting play, the sheer ridiculous, wrong-headed grandeur of the whole venture will leave you speechless…. for about fifty minutes or so.

At that point, you might find yourself checking your watch and reflecting that that this cheapo sub-Cannon action movie you’ve been watching has been conspicuously lacking in any cheapo, sub-Cannon action. In fact, aside from the inevitable training montage, there has actually been no action whatsoever, which is something of an astounding oversight for a film of this nature.

Much like its close cousin Ted V. Mikels’ ‘The Doll Squad’ (1973), ‘Hired To Kill’ is the kind of “action” movie in which the campy faffing about that leads up to the action is a sheer delight, but when it gives way to the actual real deal of people in army boots with prop machine guns creeping around door-frames and throwing hand grenades, well…. I guess the basic issue is, to make that kind of stuff exciting (as opposed to a show reel for a second rate stunt team) takes a certain degree of talent for dynamic filmmaking and narrative tension, so… yeah.

I’m sure the dozen or so stuntmen who comprise Oliver Reed’s unstoppable army [cue compulsory Elvis Costello singalong] all did their best, and it’s my duty to point out that some of the women who comprise Brian Thompson’s all-girl commando squad actually seem like fairly capable and interesting actresses who richly deserved better roles than those assigned to them here, but regardless – clearly the all-out, insurance policy defying, seat-of-yr-pants destruction fest that could have sent us out on a high and secured ‘Hired To Kill’s place as an all-time dumb-ass classic just didn't materialise.

At the end of the day, the sad fact is that all Nico Mastorakis movies, however entertaining they may initially appear, seem to eventually succumb to the all too familiar haze of safe, under-achieving blandness common to post-1990 straight-to-video productions, and ‘Hired to Kill’ is unfortunately no exception, with its essential failure to fulfill the expectations of its genre condemning it to splutter out and hit the curb, irrespective of the uproarious highlights that have kept us rolling to within reach of the hour mark.

But still – Oliver Reed in unexpected man-on-man kiss.

By the way, did you know that ‘Nights Of Cabiria’ and Antonioni's 'The Passenger' aren’t out on blu-ray yet?

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(1)A quick IMDB trawl reveals that Brian Thompson previously appeared as “Punk” in The Terminator, and in the no doubt pivotal role of “Night Slasher” in Stallone’s ‘Cobra’. In between numerous Hollywood bit-parts, he also headlined a Fred Olen Ray movie (‘Commando Squad’), and, with crushing inevitability, wrote, directed and starred in a 2014 production named ‘The Extendables’.

VHS Purgatory: The Edge of Terror (Nico Mastorakis, 1986)

PRICE PAID: A record breaking 30p from the basement of Greenwich Music & Video Exchange.

THE BOX SAYS:
“It comes at night. It’s a merciless, vicious killer. It can be your enemy or it can be your friend.”

Huh? It can do what now? What’s ‘It’ anyway? Where am I? As usual, sounds like an intern was just slinging this shit together using some magnetic poetry kit of video box copy clichés.

THE FILM DELIVERS:

The Greek director Nico Mastorakis seems to have operated as something of a one-man film production powerhouse from the ‘70s through to the ‘90s, knocking out a steady stream of independently-financed exploitation flicks ranging from the notorious sickie “Island of Death” in ’75 through to brainless fare like “The Zero Boys” and “Ninja Academy” in the late ‘80s. Given that his mighty efforts seem to have been rewarded with an almost total lack of commercial success, critical recognition or cult following that persists to this day, I can only assume Mr. Mastorakis was one determined dude. Apparently his last film as writer/director/producer was something called “.com for Murder” in 2002, which… sounds like as good a place as any for him to admit defeat and move into property management or whatever the hell he does now.

Approaching a 15-rated ‘atmospheric suspense thriller’ lensed by a guy best known (in so far as he’s known at all) for sex/violence shock tactics and utter trash (this VHS dates from the bad old days when the BBFC used to slap an ‘18’ on anything that even LOOKED like it might be a horror movie), the only edge I was expecting “Edge of Terror” to take me to was the queasy precipice between boredom and ridicule, but you know what? I’m going to drop the sneery tone right there, because “Edge of Terror” is actually pretty good.

I mean, it’s certainly not a GREAT film by any means, probably not one I’d encourage you go out of your way to track down unless you have some particular interest in it, but if you happen to find a cheap copy knocking around somewhere, go for it - you could do a lot worse. Essentially Mastorakis’ attempt at a legitimate murder/suspense film in the ‘Cape Fear’-via-Hitchcock mould, “Edge of Terror” is a well made, thoroughly watchable and not-entirely-stupid piece of work that didn’t have me checking my watch once through its 100 minute run time.

Aside from anything else, it certainly gets a thumbs up for the economy of its plotting. American thriller writer Sean, played by Meg Foster (she of the weird, iridescent eyes and fiery red hair), has rented a remote house in a near deserted Greek village in order to get some peace and quiet to finish off her new book. Unfortunately though, her landlord (an eccentric old duffer played with relish by veteran character actor Robert Morley) is promptly murdered by psychotic handyman Phil (Wings Hauser, he of the post-Jack Nicholson fevered grin, lurching nervous mannerisms and personal grooming that befits a guy named Wings Hauser). As the only witness to said crime, Sean is naturally in the hot seat for the next round of slaying, and the rest of the film essentially consists of a life and death struggle as she and Phil stalk each other around their isolated clifftop locale.

Refreshingly for a movie that could easily have degenerated into a dreary slasher, the focus stays firmly on the fight between the two characters, and they’re a lot more evenly matched than the legacy of a thousand faintly misogynistic Euro stalk n’ slash movies would lead one to expect. Meg turns out to be convincingly bad-ass heroine, keeping a cool head when pursued by a murderous loon with a sickle, going into full-on “resourceful” mode and ditching her high fashion duds in favour of a more practical boilersuit… y’know, just like a sensible, real-life woman probably would. And Wings, for his part, portrays a fairly goofy, amateur psychopath, staggering about in a confused rage and looking pretty taken aback by the fact he’s got an actual opponent to deal with rather than a screaming bimbo to terrorise. So: smart woman with a butcher’s knife vs. staggering weirdo man with a sickle? You’ve gotta like those odds.

In what I assume to be an unusual move for a low budget ‘80s movie, “Edge of Terror” is filmed in old fashioned Technicolor, and Director of Photography Andreas Bellis deserves credit for some splendid and imaginative cinematography – even on this battered, 20+ year old tape, the movie looks superb. In fact, aside from the odd detail of fashion or dialogue, the opening sequences here could easily be mistaken for one of those lavish Italian movies from the ‘70s where a load of fashionable ladies flounce around some luxurious coastal resort getting up to no good and murdering each other and what-not. At times “Edge of Terror” put me in mind of Bava’s “Bay of Blood”/“Twitch of the Death Nerve”, if admittedly with a smaller cast and minus the gratuitous carnage.

Mastorakis’s direction is sometimes a little artless, and subject to rather overcooked ‘stylistic flourishes’ (slow motion, Ridley Scott style back-lighting etc), but in general it’s pretty solid, squeezing a great deal of atmosphere out of the Greek locations, whilst his tight editing keeps things moving along at a cracking pace. The closing daybreak/final struggle sequence is particularly noteworthy, bringing an unexpected dose of disorientating otherworldliness to the film’s conclusion, recalling the eerie intensity of classic low budget ‘70s Euro-horrors like DeOssario’s “Tombs of the Blind Dead” or Rollin’s “Grapes of Death”.

The script (also by Mastorakis) lets the side down slightly, with some clunking mouthfuls of unlikely dialogue, which… ok, actually I always enjoy those, but more crucially, some poor writing later in the film that come dangerously close to ruining the good feeling the rest of the movie has built up. As noted, both Foster and Hauser work hard to establish their respective characters on a level that goes beyond mere assemblages of cliché, but increasingly in the final half hour the script begins to undermine their efforts, as Meg’s previously down to earth character suddenly starts doing incredibly stupid things, and Hauser’s shambling nutter seems to find himself imbued with Michael Myers-like supernatural cunning.

Case in point is the sequence in which Sean suddenly remembers that the landlord told her his son’s hunting gear was kept in a locked cupboard in the house; kicking it open, she suddenly finds herself with a high-powered hunting rifle! Aha! A real game-changer in a struggle-for-survival movie like this, needless to say. Emptying a box of ammo, she declares that there are 4 LIVE ROUNDS left, and we see a close up of her loading them one by one.

Now a scene like this, and a specific piece of information like that, creates certain expectations for an attentive audience – namely, that the use of those four rounds is going to prove pretty pivotal to the narrative, and is going to be drawn out for maximum tension and excitement. Not so here though, as Sean simply kicks open the upstairs window and starts randomly blasting away at the general area where Wings is patrolling around looking for her, shrugging when the ammo runs out and going back to her knife. I mean, why the hell was that scene even in the movie? Pure amateur hour stuff whichever way you look at it, and very much detrimental to the enjoyment of the film’s ‘one-on-one battle of wits’ aspect, needless to say.

And that’s a good summation of “Edge of Terror”s shortcomings really. Whilst Masterakis succeeds admirably in his presumed goal of making a good, comparatively serious film without falling back on tits and gore, his occasional lapses into silliness render it not quite good enough to have really grabbed anyone’s attention on release (especially when Robert Harmon’s similarly-plotted “The Hitcher” was kicking twenty kinds of ass in cinemas the same year). And whilst it is objectively speaking probably a better film than a lot of the oddities unearthed by DVD labels like Code:Red and Shameless, the lack of any big names or Unique Selling Point, the dull-sounding plot-line and the absence of aforementioned tits and gore - above all, the lack of any honest to god WEIRDNESS – all this sadly points toward the film’s continued obscurity in the eyes of modern day cult film fans.

Ah well. You gave it your best shot Nico, and no one can take that away from you. You made a pretty good movie, and that’s more than most of us can say.

BEST DIALOGUE:

“Your problem Sean is, you think I’m one of those super-studs from your novels, but I’m not. I’m a real, forty-two year old, overweight guy, and once in a night is enough after a hard day in the mine.”

David McCallum, playing Sean’s boyfriend in the film’s LA prologue, manages to deliver this speech with such sincerity, I immediately started thinking “boy, he’s got a pretty swanky pad for a miner”. Then before I could finish that thought, they opened the skylight and saw the Goodyear blimp! The actual Goodyear blimp! I loved that whole sequence, actually.