Hard Rain (1998) - Spectacle and fun in Salomon's career-killing actioner

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+ Best Heist Movie of the Year + Best Indiana Movie of the Year + Best Mega-flop Movie of the Year + Costliest Flop of the Year: 57.6 mil. $ range + Worst $ Return of the Year: 0.52 Times its Cost

 

Heavy downpour soaks a man on the run on this strong poster for Mikael Salomon's Hard Rain

Two related armored truck drivers are ambushed by a team of bank-robbers during a torrential rainstorm in a town in Indiana.

 

Hard Rain is written by Graham Yost (Justified (2010-15)) and directed by Mikael Salomon (A Far Off Place (1993)).

Randy Quaid (Davis Rules (1991-92)) is priceless as the greedy sheriff villain in this hugely entertaining action picture. The pace is high from beginning to end; there's humor and charming side characters as well as Christian Slater (Ask My Anything (2014)) and Morgan Freeman (Levity (2003)) skillful as the leads. The score by Christopher Young (The Tower (2002)) is involving, and the action scenes are impressive and sometimes innovative. It is also well done the way Yost manages to get the water element to work for his script, paired with a 3 mil. $ heist.

There are a few loose ends, and the shoot-outs may become a tad too numerous at some point, but Hard Rain is still one heck of an action spectacle.

 

Related posts:

 

Mikael Salomon: 1998 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess 

Far and Away (1992) - Howard, Hollywood's sweethearts visit the old West with dull result (cinematographer)

Backdraft (1991) - Ron Howard's giant, stupid Chicago-set firefighter movie (cinematographer) 

 

 

Watch the opening title sequence from the film here

 

Cost: 70 mil. $

Box office: 26.6 mil. $ - 31 mil. $ (different accounts)

= Mega-flop (returned between 0.38-0.44 times its cost)

[Hard Rain was released 16 January (North America) and runs 96 minutes. John Woo was slated to direct but bowed out to do Face/Off. 10 companies were involved in the financing and production of the film. A 6 mil. $ set was created in an aircraft hangar in California. Shooting took place from August 1996 - January 1997 in California, Indiana and Toronto, Canada. The ending of the film was changed due to poor test audience feedback. It opened #5, behind holdover hit Titanic, fellow new releases Good Will Hunting and Fallen and holdover hit As Good As It Gets, to an 8 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it left the top 5 in its 2nd weekend and grossed 19.8 mil. $. One source claims the film only made 6.8 mil. $ abroad, while another claims that its final gross was 31 mil. $ (11.2 mil. $ abroad in that case.) Roger Ebert gave the film a 1/4 star review, translating to 4 notches under this one. Slater was imprisoned for about 90 days on drug and violence charges directly following the premiere. Freeman later publicly dissed the film, and Minnie Driver said in an interview in 1997 (so before the film was even released) that she hated working on it due to the wet conditions (...). Salomon turned to TV and a prolific career directing there but did return theatrically with Freezer (2014). Freeman returned in Deep Impact (1998); Slater in Basil (1998). Hard Rain is rotten at 30 % with a 4.40/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Hard Rain?

Gigantic (2008) - Aselton's idiosyncratic romcom debut

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Zooey Deschanel finds herself in an extremely short dress in a flush apartment on this yellow, everything-everywhere poster for Matt Aselton's Gigantic

A bed salesman in New York falls for a rude customer's daughter, who, however, is overwhelmed by his love.

 

Gigantic is written by Adam Nagata (Lying and Stealing (2019)) and debuting co-writer/director Matt Aselton (French Exit (2020, executive producer)). 

The film has good ingredients in Paul Dano (L.I.E. (2001)), Zooey Deschanel (Yes Man (2008)), John Goodman (The Monuments Men (2014)), Jane Alexander (The Cider House Rules (1999)) and Edward Asner (Island Prey (2001)), who all contribute more or less to its romcom stew, one that is a bit too much of a male patriarchal drivel reality for my taste. - One scene is bound to downright repulse quite a lot of female audiences (and perhaps rightly so.)

But there is also some fun and good scenes, - like the one in which Deschanel calls her substance abuse-mother in Florida, who doesn't recognize her voice. But the script doesn't answer a couple of fundamental oddities in it, which makes it appear somewhat unfair: Who is Zack Galifianakis' (Due Date (2010)) homeless attacker, whom Dano appears to kill, - and why does he attack him in the first place? - What is this supposed to mean? And why has Dano's character from childhood been obsessed with adopting a Chinese baby? No one every asks this (fairly obvious) question, and it honestly seems freaky, not least because he ends up receiving one in Gigantic.

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: Unknown

Box office: 165k $

= Uncertain, but almost surely a box office disaster

[Gigantic premiered 8 September (Toronto International Film Festival) and runs 98 minutes. The story is based on Aselton's childhood wish for his parents to adopt a Chinese baby for him to have a younger sibling. Shooting took place in New York and Connecticut for 23 days in March 2008. The film opened #68 to a 10k $ first weekend in 1 theater in North America, where it never attained a higher position although it widened to 11 theaters, grossing 102k $ (61.8 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were France with 40k $ (24.2 %) and the UK with 22k $ (13.3 %), - the only two other markets listed on the film's Box Office Mojo site. If made on a realistic, low 3-5 mil. $ budget, the film would rank as a box office disaster. Roger Ebert gave the film a 2.5/4 star review, equal in rating to this one. Aselton returned with Robin Banks and the Bank Robbers (2014, TV-series) and theatrically with Lying and Stealing (2019). Dano returned in Taking Woodstock (2009); Deschanel in Yes Man (2008); and Goodman in The Emperor's New Schoool (2007-08, TV-series short) and theatrically in Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009). Gigantic is rotten at 36 % with a 4.60/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Gigantic?