Hardware (1990)

Director: Richard Stanley

Starring: Dylan McDermott, Stacey Travis, John Lynch

The head of a cyborg reactivates, rebuilds itself, and goes on a violent rampage in a space marine’s girlfriend’s apartment.

In a dystopian world, Mo and Shades are friends who buy and sell stuff to junk dealer Alvy. When Mo buys a robot head, he gives it to his girlfriend, Jill, as a Christmas gift. Jill is creative and makes sculptures out of almost anything. Having bought the rest of the robot parts from Mo, Alvy researches the robot. It turns out the robot is a MARK-13, a highly advanced prototype weapon.

I must be honest I found the film terribly boring and slow in the beginning. What a yawner, I thought. Very little made sense until the halfway mark and I almost stopped watching. Almost the entire film is set in Jill’s apartment. I thought it was going to be a forgettable film, but when it finally shifted gear, it was non-stop action – all within the confines of one apartment!

It actually is amazing what they’ve accomplished with a single location. Who would have thought so much could happen – with so much action!! – in one apartment? There were shootouts, explosions, suspense, horror, and total chaos – and on top of this it became a survival story. Hell, I never expected it to turn out the way it did. This is like a single location ‘The Terminator’!

‘Hardware’ earned $5.7 million on a budget of $1.5 million, and won awards for Best Director, and Best Visual Effects.

Would I watch it again? Maybe I’ll skip the first few minutes, and watch the second half again. If you watch it for the first time, you obviously will have to watch the beginning.