I’m a fan of Walter Hill and was in the mood for one of his neo-noir action thrillers. I once had an ex-rental VHS copy of Johnny Handsome (1989) that was my first viewing long ago and my memory was that it was a three star movie – good but maybe not essential. I found myself more into it this time around. Of course, I dug the bar neon lighting, the medium shots of faces peering through window slats, the New Orleans atmosphere, and the Ry Cooder blues guitar soundtrack. The plot is basically an 1980s update of old melodramas with a Donald E Westlake style set-up merged with a quasi-Douglas Sirk-ian medical drama about rehabilitation. Mickey Rourke plays the facially disfigured Johnny Selby – nicknamed “Johnny Handsome” – whose best friend (Scott Wilson) is killed in a diamond store heist when they partner up with a pair of nasty double-crossing thieves played by Lance Henriksen and Ellen Barkin. Even when Johnny’s in prison, Henriksen puts out a hit on him – which leaves poor Johnny in the hospital in the care of a kindly doctor (Forest Whitaker) who wants to perform experimental surgery to give him a new face and a new life. Here is where the movie might lose some people because it leaves the crime plot on the back burner and examines Johnny’s rehabilitation, but I love this part of the movie; it gives Rourke the chance to craft such a sad, genuine performance – the prototypical “soulful brute.” Even when Johnny’s paroled with a new ‘Mickey Rourke 1989-vintage’ face and captures the eye of a plucky receptionist (Elisabeth McGovern, giving so much more to a ‘love-interest’ part), he can’t live down his past with a cop always hanging around waiting for him to slip up (Morgan Freeman, playing the Sterling Hayden role). That and Johnny’s eventual settling the score with those who murdered his friend and left him for dead. The whole cast is firing on all cylinders, Barkin is particularly a stand-out with her femme fatale character, and I loved all the POV shots Hill uses to get you into Johnny’s subjective world. Rented on iTunes. Recommended.
VHS Tracking 