Reaction & Review | Hellbound

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be checking out a thriller from 1994. That movie is "Hellbound".

So, for those of you who may not happen to remember, about a couple of years ago, back during the early days of me doing this series, I reviewed a movie called "Lone Wolf McQuade". It was the only movie that I watched which starred Chuck Norris. A man who is mostly known for outdated memes, shitty acting, and losing a fight to Bruce Lee. And the movie itself was a stupid plotless action movie that had no kind of substance whatsoever, and it was, overall, a waste of fucking time.

To be honest with you, guys, I really had no interest in covering anymore Chuck Norris movies, because the man cannot act, and the few films that I looked up which starred him didn't really sound all that interesting to me. But then I happened to discover this movie at one of my local video stores one day, as I was browsing through some movies that I wanted to get at the time, and this movie caught my interest, mostly because of it's premise. Somehow, two cops, one of them played by Chuck Norris, ends up discovering something evil when a murder investigation turns into a battle against the forces of evil, in which some satanic messenger comes back to life to, I guess, do something evil. Perhaps maybe he wants to resurrect Satan or something, I don't know. It doesn't really make a whole lot of sense, so I'm hoping that the movie will explain it further once I start watching this thing. But I will say that the premise sounded promising enough for me to give Mr. Norris here a second chance.

I'm really hoping for this film to be interesting. You'll note that I said that I want it to be "interesting". I am almost ruling this thing out on being any good, what with the movie's star and all. But hey, you know what? Maybe this movie will actually shock me somehow, and wind up being really good. I strongly doubt it, but who knows? It might still end up surprising me in someway. So really, the only way I'm gonna find out whether or not this movie will be any good at all, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Hellbound".

10 minutes later

OK, I have a really stupid question here, and I know it's a trivial one, but it's beginning to bother me a little bit. Why is there so much smoke in this scene?! I ask this, because most of the scene has been covered in smoke, and it's making the picture quality look like shit. I understand it's still early in this film, and there's always a chance it could look better after this prologue finishes, but, so far, we're kinda off to a bit of a bad start.

15 minutes later

By the way, guys, not only is the picture quality an issue with smoke, but it's also an issue with anything involving darkness, and it somehow looks even WORSE than what was shown in the prologue! Jesus Christ...this movie is slowly becoming unwatchable, guys.

13 minutes later

Well, guys, I just learned something new today. Apparently, drivers in Israel don't understand sarcasm, so they think the term "shitty driver", at least according to Detective Jackson, means that they are a "hotshot" driver. I don't know how that was suppose to be funny, unless the joke was that people in Israel don't get what sarcasm is. And if that WAS suppose to be the joke, then it still wound up being shit.

14 minutes later

So our hero, Detective Jackson, just stole some food from the front desk of Jerusalem University as soon as he and Sgt. Shatter got there. I'm gonna say this now, guys, the more that I see Detective Jackson on screen, the more that I want to see him die by the time the movie's over. And if I don't get that, then I'm not gonna be a very happy person. Just thought I'd let you guys know.

19 minutes later

OK, I have another really stupid question that I know I'm not gonna get an answer to, but I'm gonna ask it anyway. So our villain, Prosatanos, has been searching for the pieces of a broken scepter that was from the prologue that's suppose to be able to open the gates of Hell. How exactly does he know where to find all of the pieces of this scepter? My only guess is that since he was broken free from his tomb many decades ago, he's had plenty of time to find all of the pieces at all of the exact known places. Most of them we don't ever get to see, mind you, since we only get to see one fucking example of him gaining a piece of the scepter. And if that is the case, then why has it taken him this fucking long to find the pieces of the scepter if he's had all this free time to find them? I understand that I'm probably putting WAY too much thought into this, but it's questions like these that makes a stupid movie like this even dumber than what it already is.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Hellbound". I'm gonna shut this crap off here...all right. Good lord, this was fucking boring. Well, I guess that kinda gives away what I thought about this movie as a whole. I mean, granted, I knew it wasn't gonna be any good, but I still wanted it to be kinda interesting on a cheesy, yet sorta awesome level. Well...no, this movie is nothing like that whatsoever.

So, rather than me summarizing what I already thought about this movie, let's actually talk about it, shall we? I'm gonna start with writing. The writing here, honestly, could've been really interesting, if you had a better script. I say this, because the premise does sound sorta interesting, in which some emissary of Satan or something had originally been sealed away by some knights of some fantasy world from 1186 A.D, and then later he gets released from his tomb by a couple of grave robbers. I'm gonna mention that scene involving the grave robbers later on. But getting back to the story, in the prologue before the grave robbers, after the king and his men seal Prosatanos within his tomb, the king takes the scepter and lays it on top of the tomb in which he destroys it with his sword into 9 pieces, thinking that he's destroyed the source of Prosatano's power. The pieces of the scepter are later scattered across the world, in which Prosatanos ends up seeking and killing 9 different holy priests that are holding each sealed piece of the scepter so that he can open the gates of Hell by doing some sort of ritual and, I guess, Satan is reborn. I don't know, it's not entirely made clear on that part. But in any case, Sgt. Shatter and Detective Jackson, two Chicago cops, end up going to Israel when some rabbi was killed by Prosatanos, in which they later learn that they are doing battle against the forces of evil in order to stop Prosotanos from bringing forth hellish evil to Earth.

Now, you would think that what I just described would sound kinda interesting. And like I said earlier, it probably would've been interesting, had there been some effort put into this writing. I originally thought, upon hearing about the 9 pieces of the broken scepter, that this was going to be some sort of fetch quest in which Shatter and Jackson go to look for the pieces of the scepter before Prosatanos can get his hands on them. But instead, as I mentioned a moment ago, they go to Israel instead, and this is where the movie comes to a complete stop. We have tons of padding in this movie that has no reason to exist! Most of it is spent on our two main characters, as they are either investigating shit, or they are stopping this kid from scamming American tourists out of their money by stealing their wallets, which happens all of twice in this movie. And as for the latter subplot, apparently, it only exists just so we can get the story moving, because this kid somehow knows where exactly Shatter and Jackson need to go because fuck you, that is why, and none of it interesting in the slightest. And for a movie that's suppose to be advertising itself as a thriller, it's more boring than thrilling. Which is a horrible thing, because thrillers are not suppose to bore you. Not only that, but this movie also tries to pass itself off as comedy. And I can tell you right now, this movies FAILS as a comedy. The jokes are shit, and the dialogue is even worse. Most of it comes from Detective Jackson, which is insufferable, but I'm gonna get more into that when I talk about the characters.

Right now, though, I want to mention something else about this film's writing. You guys may have happened to notice it earlier, but when I complained about why exactly it was taking so long for Prosatanos to find the pieces of the scepter since he was released from his tomb, I was mostly just trying to stretch out an issue that may have just been me putting way too much thought into, considering the fact that it's just a dumb action film starring Chuck Norris. Well...then we get a scene where Shatter and Jackson break into the Jerusalem P.D. building, and they end up trying to find files regarding some murders involving certain priests from a couple of years ago. Shatter calls Leslie, another character who I'll bring up later, who's also an assistant to Professor Lockley AKA Prosatanos in disguise, and he asks her to get information on the expeditions Lockley's been on for the past couple of years. And all of them involve the priests that were killed on the exact dates that Lockley's been on his certain expeditions. The first one dated back to 1991. Now here's where I have to intervene, because the grave robbers I mentioned earlier that broke Prosatano's tomb, that took place in 1951, meaning that it's been a whole 40 years since he was released! So my big question is what the FUCK has this guy been doing for the past 40 years?! Why did he wait until the past couple of years in order to go on his hunting scheme for the scepter pieces? Was he just fucking around his tomb for all that time until he realized "Oh yeah, I'm suppose to be looking for pieces of my scepter so I can release my dark master and Hell can finally rule Earth. What the hell am I still doing here?!" Dear Lord, this movie is terrible with it's fucking writing.

So now, let's get into the characters. Well, first of all, what fucking characters? There is nobody here that has any shred of depth or likability to their characters. And I know for an action movie that you don't necessarily need well-developed characters, but you still want a reason to care about them in some way. Well, this movie does nothing to make you care about them. Chuck Norris plays Sgt. Shatter and he has all the charisma of expired milk. Detective Jackson is the worst, because, as I mentioned earlier, most of the "comedy" comes from him. And none it is funny whatsoever. And whenever he's not cracking jokes, he's mostly either complaining about being in Israel, hates that it's too hot over there and wants some AC, or on about 5 different occasions he'll mention to Shatter that he wants something to eat because he's hungry. Oh, and he mentions that he's a Chicago Bulls fan. Get it? Because he's from Chicago. Hahahaha...ha...anyway, beyond that, there is nothing, and I mean NOTHING about his character that makes him redeemable or worth caring about in the slightest. Oh, and I also should mention that he sadly does not meet his end in this movie, as I was hoping he would. Spoiler, in case you really wanted to know the fate of Detective Jackson. The only other character I can mention is Leslie Hawkins, who not only plays Lockley's assistant and is also personality free, but also has a forced relationship at the end with Shatter. The only interesting bit about her is not the character itself, but the actress playing her, Sheree J. Wilson. She's also one of the co-stars of "Walker, Texas Ranger", a show that made Chuck Norris into the star that he was at the time. So there you go, there's your useless trivia of the day, in case you really cared.

So beyond all that, the writing here is terrible. Which, for an action film, I normally would give some of that pass. However, there really isn't a whole lot of action here. So it might be difficult for me to recommend this to fans of plotless action films, because there really isn't much action to be had here. So with that being said, let's get into the acting. Now I stated earlier, a couple of times, that Chuck Norris was known to be a shitty actor. At least, to me, he is. Now some people might wonder why that is, because they may have never seen anything starring this man. Well, I mentioned it before when I reviewed "Lone Wolf McQuade", but I can mention it again here. The big reason why he's not a very good actor is because the man lacks any sort of expression on his face. Most of the time, he will give off the same stoic look he does for most of the time he's on camera. Once in a while, he might crack a smile, but he doesn't have any sort of expression beyond that. Which is also coupled with the fact that his acting is just PAINFULLY wooden. Which, for some people who have seen his movies, see that as some sort of charm as to what makes Chuck Norris stand out with his acting. But for myself, personally, I really don't see much of that charm here. So to me, it's just another phoned in, been there done that performance from Mr. Norris. The rest of the acting ranges on being decent though. The best actor, by far, would have to go to Christopher Neame, who plays the movie's villain, Prosatanos. His performance in this thing is honestly almost endearing to listen to. It's kinda hammy, but not to a point where he has to overact. Most of his voice is probably filtered to sound demonic, but he still gives off enough charm to where he actually seems to be having fun with his performance. So, if you want to watch this movie for whatever baffling reason, watch it for Neame's performance, because he's easily the best actor in the entire movie. Everyone else, minus the film's star, is decent. It's not great, but it's at least serviceable for what they could do with a shallow script.

There honestly is not a whole lot here when it comes to special effects. There is very, very little gore here. The blood effects are OK for what they are. But again, there really isn't much here for blood. Which is kinda disappointing, considering that this movie is about Chuck Norris fighting the forces of Hell, you would think the filmmakers would try to take advantage of that concept. But sadly, they don't. Costuming here is pretty cheap, especially towards the end where we get to see our villain where some sort of monster mask. Don't ask, it kinda makes sense, but not really. But still, it looks really cheap. So beyond all that, the special effects here are pretty disappointing to say the least.

Camerawork here is OK for what it is, but I do want to comment on the picture quality for just a second, because this is something that bothered the shit out of me for a while. For some reason, in some scenes that are filmed in darkness, the picture quality looks very grainy to a point where I can't see what's going on with some characters in some scenes. Now when it's filmed anytime during the day, the quality is perfectly fine. But it's only at night where the quality drop on the picture looks really grainy. And that also includes the opening prologue, which involves the knights and Prosatanos. For some reason, there is so much smoke in that scene to where it started to become difficult to watch what with the film's decline in picture quality. Now I don't know if that's either my bad eyesight, or if it's the quality of this DVD that was put out by Warner Bros. Though technically speaking, Cannon Films made this movie, and it was their last film, too, before they went under. So it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if the poor quality was on their end when they put this movie out originally on VHS. But I am also gonna put some blame on Warner Bros. since they could've easily taken some more time to clean up some of the grainy mess that is present on this DVD. At least, to me, it's a noticeable grainy mess. But anyway, the lighting here is decent, save for any scenes involving darkness. Sound-mix is mixed fine. The score here is OK for the most part. It's not anything amazing by any stretch, but at least it kinda works for the film.

Ultimately, guys, when everything is said and done, am I able to recommend "Hellbound"? No. There is honestly no way I can recommend this movie. As I stated earlier, it's difficult for me to recommend this to fans of plotless action movies, what with the lack of action that is missing here. Maybe if you're, like, one of those die-hard fans of Chuck Norris and you don't care how shitty his acting is, then you might be able to get into this with almost no problems. But for everyone else...no. As a thriller, it sucks. As a comedy, it's not funny in the slightest. And the story itself, while interesting on the surface, is ultimately a letdown. I knew, going into this movie that it wasn't going to be any good, but it still had some potential to be very interesting. But instead, I get another bland, boring film starring Chuck Norris. And maybe this is just a sign that I should stay away from his other films, if this is the kind of performances I'm gonna get from him. So yeah, guys, I cannot recommend "Hellbound" for the reasons that I already gave out. Now since this movie let me down as a thriller, I'm gonna go and watch a good thriller. And the first thing that comes to my mind is "Perfect Blue". That movie is amazing, and I haven't seen that in about a year or so. So, I'm gonna go and do that next after I get done putting this review together.

Anyways, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.