Hard Target is a 1993 American action film directed by Hong Kong film director John Woo. The film stars Jean-Claude Van Damme as Chance Boudreaux, an out-of-work homeless Cajun merchant seaman and former United States Force Recon Marine who saves a young woman named Natasha Binder (Yancy Butler) from a gang of thugs in New Orleans. Chance learns that Binder is searching for her missing father (Chuck Pfarrer), and agrees to aid Binder in her search. They soon learn that Binder's father has died at the hands of hunt organisers Emil Fouchon (Lance Henriksen) and Pik van Cleaf (Arnold Vosloo), a ruthless businessman and his right-hand mercenary, who arrange the hunting of homeless men as a form of recreational sport. The screenplay was written by Pfarrer and is based on the 1932 film adaptation of Richard Connell's 1924 short story "The Most Dangerous Game". It is the first installment in the Hard Target film series.
Hard Target was Woo's first American and English-language film, and is widely regarded as the first major Hollywood studio production directed by a Chinese – and more broadly, Asian – filmmaker. Universal Pictures was nervous about having Woo direct a feature and sent in director Sam Raimi to look over the film's production and to take Woo's place as director if he were to fail. Woo went through several scripts finding mostly martial arts films with which he was not interested. After deciding on Pfarrer's script for Hard Target, Woo wanted to have actor Kurt Russell in the lead role, but found Russell too busy with other projects. Woo then went with Universal's initial choice of having Van Damme star. Woo got along with Van Damme during filming and raised the amount of action in the film as he knew that the actor was up for it.
After 65 days of filming in New Orleans, Woo had trouble with the Motion Picture Association of America to secure the R rating that Universal wanted. Woo made dozens of cuts to the film until the MPAA allowed it an R rating. On its initial release, Hard Target received mixed reviews from film critics but was a financial success. The film has gained a cult following especially for the action scenes, establishing Hard Target as a cult classic. Some critics regard it as one of Woo's best American films.
Plot In New Orleans, a homeless United States Force Recon Marine and Vietnam War veteran named Douglas Binder is the target of a hunt. He is given a belt containing $10,000 and told that he must reach the other side of the city to win the money and his life. Pursuing him is the hunt organizer and wealthy sportsman, Emil Fouchon, his lead right-hand mercenary Pik van Cleaf, a businessman named Mr. Lopacki – Fouchon's client who has paid $500,000 for the opportunity to hunt a human, and assassins including Stephan and Peterson. Binder fails to reach his destination and is killed by three crossbow bolts. Van Cleaf retrieves the money belt.
Binder's estranged daughter Natasha drives from Detroit to New Orleans in search of her father. Shortly after arriving in the city, she is attacked by a group of muggers who attempt to rob and rape her. She is saved by a man with exceptional martial arts skills named Chance Boudreaux, a former Force Recon Marine and a sailor who is currently out of work. Boudreaux is initially hesitant to involve himself in her mission, but after learning he has unpaid union dues, he reluctantly allows Natasha to hire him as her guide and bodyguard during her search. Unfortunately, the search goes slowly as the city's police force is on strike, making the hunters' livelihood easier to conduct.
Natasha discovers that her father distributed fliers for a seedy recruiter named Randal Poe who has been secretly supplying Fouchon with homeless men with war experience and no family ties. Natasha questions Randal about her father's death, but they are discovered by an eavesdropping Van Cleaf. Fouchon and Van Cleaf beat Poe and cut his ear as a punishment for sending them a man with a daughter. New Orleans Police detective Marie "May" Mitchell is reluctant to investigate Binder's disappearance until his charred body is discovered in the ashes of a derelict building. The death is deemed an accident, but Boudreaux searches the ruins and finds Binder's other matching dog tag,(as they always are given in pairs) which was pierced by one of the crossbow bolts. Van Cleaf's henchmen suddenly ambush Boudreaux and beat him unconscious to scare him and Natasha out of town. When he recovers, he offers Mitchell the dog tag as evidence that Binder was murdered. With the investigation getting closer, Van Cleaf and Fouchon decide to relocate their hunting business and begin eliminating "loose ends". The medical examiner who had been hiding the evidence of the hunt is killed along with Poe. Meanwhile, Boudreaux's friend, Elijah Roper, who is also a homeless veteran, is the next to participate in Fouchon's hunt and also ends up dead. Mitchell, Natasha and Boudreaux arrive moments later at Randal's car and are ambushed by Van Cleaf and several of his men. During the shootout, Mitchell is shot in the chest and dies. Boudreaux kills a handful of the mercenaries and escapes with Natasha to the bayou. Fouchon and Van Cleaf assemble their mercenary team and five hired hunters to continue the chase.
Boudreaux leads Natasha to his uncle Clarence Douvee's house deep in the bayou and enlists his help to defeat the men. Boudreaux, Natasha, and Douvee lead the hunting party to the "Mardi Gras graveyard" (a warehouse of old damaged Mardi Gras floats and statues) and kill off Fouchon's men one by one. Van Cleaf is finally gunned down by Boudreaux in a shootout. In the end, only Fouchon is left, but he holds Boudreaux at bay by taking Natasha hostage and stabbing Douvee in the chest with his arrow. Boudreaux charges him, attacking with a flurry of blows, and then drops a grenade in his pants. Fouchon attempts in vain to dismantle the grenade but gets incinerated in the explosion.
Douvee is revealed to have survived being stabbed, as the arrow Fouchon used only punctured his whiskey flask. Boudreaux, Natasha, and Douvee then depart the scene.
Cast
Jean-Claude Van Damme as Chance Boudreaux, an out-of-work Cajun United States Marine Corps Force Reconnaissance veteran, a merchant seaman, a homeless sailor, and a talented martial artist. After Boudreaux saves Natasha Binder, he is hired by her to help search for her missing father. Lance Henriksen as Emil Fouchon, a wealthy sportsman who hunts homeless former soldiers for sport. After finding that he is being investigated by Chance and Natasha, Fouchon sends out his gang led by Pik van Cleaf to ambush them. Arnold Vosloo as Pik Van Cleaf, a collaborator and the lead right-hand mercenary of Fouchon who takes part in his sport of hunting men. He leads the crew of men who are sent out to murder Chance and Natasha. Van Cleaf's surname is a reference to actor Lee van Cleef. Yancy Butler as Natasha Binder, a young woman who comes to New Orleans to search for her estranged father, Douglas, whom she has not seen since she was seven years old. When Natasha is attacked by thugs, she is saved by Chance Boudreaux who agrees to help her find her father. Kasi Lemmons as Detective Maria "May" Mitchell, a New Orleans police detective who works in the office while the police are on strike. Mitchell helps Natasha by ordering another autopsy when they show her the pierced dog tags that her father had. Willie C. Carpenter as Elijah Roper, Chance Boudreaux's friend who is also homeless and former United States Army Special Forces. Wilford Brimley as Uncle Clarence Douvee, Chance Boudreaux's uncle who lives deep in the Bayou. Chance and Natasha take shelter at his home as well as have him help during the film's final shoot out. Other actors in the film include Chuck Pfarrer (the film's screenwriter) as Natasha's father Douglas Binder, Eliott Keener as Randal Poe, Marco St. John as Dr. Morton, Joe Warfield as Ismal Zenan, Sven-Ole Thorsen as Stephan, Jules Sylvester as Peterson, David Efron as Billy Bob, and Bob Apisa as Lopacki. Ted Raimi, brother of producer Sam Raimi, makes a cameo appearance as a man on the street.
Production Development After making Hard Boiled in Hong Kong, director John Woo decided to take an offer to work in the United States, where he would find himself happier as a filmmaker with a preferable work pace and more reasonable hours. Woo was first offered this job in the United States by Universal Pictures chairman Tom Pollock after he had seen Woo's film The Killer. Universal was not eager to have Woo direct an entire feature and only agreed after what producer James Jacks called a "difficult period of convincing". Universal was worried about having an Asian director on set who had limited command of English on a large-scale project. They hired American director Sam Raimi to oversee the film's production and to have him on standby if Woo was not able to fulfill his role as a director. Raimi was very excited to work with Woo as he was a fan of his Hong Kong films. Raimi was also confident in Woo's directorial skills, stating that "Woo at 70% is still going to blow away most American action directors working at 100%."
On his arrival in the United States, Woo went through several scripts before deciding on Hard Target. Describing the scripts he received, Woo stated that "Some of them were good – some of them were very good – but the rest were simply martial-arts movies and I told producers that I had no interest in doing those kinds of films anymore. I'd done a lot of them already." One of the scripts offered to Woo at this period was for Face/Off, which he turned down at the time, turned off by the science fiction aspect of the story. The script for Hard Target was written by Chuck Pfarrer. Director Andrew Davis was interested in the script, but ultimately turned it down.Hall, 1999. p.166 Woo read Pfarrer's script for Hard Target appreciating that it was a "simple but powerful story, with a lot of feeling underneath. For a good action film you need a solid structure. Chuck gave me that". Woo also stated that the story is "less John Woo" but the visual aspect would be "very John Woo". Pfarrer wrote the script originally basing it on the film The Naked Prey. After the script did not turn out Pfarrer worked on a script influenced by the film Aliens that became the basis for his comic Virus. The final attempt was a script based on the 1932 film The Most Dangerous Game. Pfarrer had the story take place in New Orleans to give an explanation of Jean-Claude Van Damme's accent.
Pre-production