14 Hardcore

[Cronenfly]

HARDCORE (Paul Schrader, 1979) - #PHIDFE014

INDICATOR LIMITED EDITION SPECIAL FEATURES:
• 4K restoration from the original negative
• Original mono audio
• Hardcore Nitzsche (2017, tbc mins): All new documentary on composer Jack Nitzsche
• Michael Chapman on 'Hardcore' (2004, 12 mins): the acclaimed cinematographer discusses his work on Hardcore
• The Guardian Interview with Paul Schrader (1993, tbc mins): the director discusses his career at the National Film Theatre, London with journalist Derek Malcolm (audio only)
• Isolated score
• Original theatrical trailer
• Image gallery
• New and improved English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
• Limited edition exclusive booklet with a new essay by critic and writer Brad Stevens
• UK Blu-ray premiere
• Limited Dual Format Edition of 3,000 copies
• More TBC

[Big Ben]

Interesting that the two Twilight Time Hardcore commentaries are not listed yet. I was regretting buying the TT, but I guess I'll reserve full self-flagellation until the final specs are announced.

Next to go OOP after this looks likely to be HARDCORE, which is selling briskly: powerhousefilms.co.uk/product/hardcore-dfe

Snagged a copy of Hardcore off of Amazon UK yesterday because of the announcement. Looks like they have plenty left there if any of you need a copy.

[Morbii]

Note to others: if you want a comparison between the Indicator and Twilight Time for Hardcore, don't google "hardcore beaver", at least not at work.

[MichaelB]

Note to others: if you want a comparison between the Indicator and Twilight Time for Hardcore, don't google "hardcore beaver", at least not at work.

And if you have cause to look up the DVD Beaver review of Blow-Up, as I did recently*, be warned that "beaver blow-up" will only return it as the eleventh result. But if you're in the market for a Justin Bieber-themed blow-up sex doll (judiciously renamed Just In Beaver), it seems that there are quite a few on the market.

(*Just to crack down on speculation, this was in connection with the already-announced Fragment of Fear, not an unexpected future acquisition.)

[L.A.]

Can I ask this simple question: is Hardcore any good?

[HJackson]

I think it's great. If you like Schrader's other stuff I can't see you having a problem with it.

[colinr0380]

Isn't it meant to be one of Schrader's most 'autobiographical' films, in the sense that the portrait of the rather stifling and strict Calvinist community that the daughter has run away from is kind of based on Schrader's own upbringing? Its troubling theme of a 'man with a mission in the filth of the big city' is part of what makes it tie in well with Taxi Driver too.

(Plus Hardcore has become a bit notorious now as an internet meme of George C. Scott watching the Jack and Jill trailer!)

[eerik]

After that, Hardcore is likely to be the next title to go OOP.

Hardcore before The Big Heat? That's pretty surprising to me

[MichaelB]

Hardcore before The Big Heat? That's pretty surprising to me

This business is full of surprises, and Hardcore has been a surprise hit.

[willoneill]

Hardcore before The Big Heat? That's pretty surprising to me

This business is full of surprises, and Hardcore has been a surprise hit.

I would theorize that Hardcore's cult status was upgraded by that "George C. Scott horrified" meme that went around a while ago.

[MichaelB]

Yes, that may well be true!

[Dr Amicus]

Also, I don't recall Hardcore being readily available in the UK before - unlike The Big Heat, I've never seen it on TV (at least terrestrial) and it's been on my must-get-round-to-watch-that list for years so if it had been screened, I would have been likely to watch it.

Or there could be a lot of Paul Schrader fans out there - or indeed lots of film students who have compared / contrasted Taxi Driver and The Searchers at University and want to see another variation on the theme...

[knives]

Or the fact it is a color film about porn. A basic synopsis of each suggests to me one is more likely to get blind buys than the other.

[colinr0380]

They'll be shocked to find out it is as much if not more about religion as porn! I've been mostly familiar with the film up to now by the mention of it during that Scene By Scene with Paul Schrader programme.

[jlnight]

Also, I don't recall Hardcore being readily available in the UK before - unlike The Big Heat, I've never seen it on TV (at least terrestrial) and it's been on my must-get-round-to-watch-that list for years so if it had been screened, I would have been likely to watch it.

If you're talking about Hardcore then it had one screening on Channel 4 back in 1989. In fact here is the ad breaks, continuity and closedown from that broadcast! I saw it on one of the Sky Movie channels about 15 or 16 years ago and have been wanting to catch it again. Now I can.

[DarkImbecile]

The conversation earlier this week on Paul Schrader in the Twilight Time thread prompted me to finally watch the Indicator release of Hardcore I've had on my shelf for almost 8 months now. I found it fascinating, especially in comparison with his work before and since, and also because - for all the darkness of its subject matter - it is intermittently quite funny, much more so than most of Schrader's films, as when

Spoiler

Scott explains at length the five TULIP principles of Calvinism to Niki while they wait for a plane. She says (all of this paraphrased, as somehow this hasn't made it into the IMDB Quotes section), "And I thought I was fucked up"; Scott says she's only looking at it from the outside and has to consider it from the inside. Niki: "Anything can look normal if you consider it from the inside; some guy almost convinced me to fuck his German shepherd once that way." Scott: (muttering) "It's not exactly the same." This dark sense of humor toward the clash between Scott's conservative Midwestern puritan ("pilgrim", as Peter Boyle's sleazy detective repeatedly refers to him) and the curdled West Coast commodification of the sexual revolution keeps what could have been unbearably bleak material watchable - though as the DP says on one of the extras, making the film was basically unbearably depressing for the crew, who couldn't wait to get away from the set, in contrast to the random people who kept trying to sneak in for a peek at the more prurient subject matter.

I also appreciated how this Calvinist philosophy as explained in the film (and this is definitely not something I know enough about to speak to whether Schrader's articulation is actually representative of this particular theological strand) provides the framework for Scott's purgatorial journey through "total depravity" with the certainty that he and his daughter can come through the other side due to God's unalterable selection of them as individuals worthy of heaven. Whether or not he or his daughter will actually be able to live with and atone for what they've done and return to normalcy in Grand Rapids, on the other hand, is far less clear to the viewer than it is to Scott.

Hardcore is a quality character study, and forty years later serves as a sociological examination of an era experiencing an seismic shift in cultural attitudes; I highly recommend it to anyone interested in Schrader who hasn't seen it yet.

[Boosmahn]

Watched Hardcore for the first time the other night; it was pretty damn good. George C. Scott's performance is fantastic, probably my favorite part of the film. (Can anybody explain why he got a Stinker Award nomination?)

The ending is perhaps the weakest aspect of this film and feels like an entirely different movie

Spoiler

(and after reading that Kristen was originally supposed to be hit by a car, things come into a much clearer light). Additionally, the line where Kristen says that Ratan "loved" her was particularly infuriating and made her come across as hopelessly inept.

Given the movie's bleak subject matter, I was fully expecting one of two outcomes, with either

Spoiler

A. Jake being murdered in a snuff film, or

B. Jake to go through hell only to discover Kristen has been dead the entire time.

Despite these nitpicks, I still enjoyed Hardcore quite a bit. Now I just have to see First Reformed...

[Big Ben]

It's a good film undercut by it's ending I agree. Scott, for what it's worth is really great in the film.

About the ending:

Spoiler

I imagine the reality that your daughter had been murdered would have been simply been too much and that that's entirely the reason. My knowledge of that kind of porn exists only from the stuff I read from Wired magazine, dumb Youtube videos and what my cop friends have said about it. I cannot fathom Schrader making a film culminating in a man learning that his teenage daughter has been murdered on film so bad people could get off on it. I Schrader could have done it but deep down I understand the whole Christian Redemption thing from a writing perspective. You could go for a downright ghastly ending sure but even my depressive ass has it's limits.

It's really not a pleasant film by any means. I watched this as a double feature with De Palma's Body Double and I gotta say it was a really weird afternoon.

[domino harvey]

I had to Google the "Stinker Awards," so I wouldn't sweat it too much. I know Ebert championed the film on its release, and I think he had a little more reach than some ex-ushers in LA

[tenia]

I actually found the ending to be quite bleak too.

Spoiler

There's something downbeat to the ending for me, and I took at as a failed Christian redemption. The daughter did feel inept to me, and unsalvageable. If I had to imagine their familial future, I don't see Scott and his daughter being able to reconnect, mostly because of the daughter's behavior. Even if she's still alive, to me, their relationship will only be on palliative care and will spiral down again quickly (though probably not as bad).

[Roger Ryan]

I tend to think that viewers are confused by Scott's performance because he's playing it for comedy at least forty percent of the time. Schrader was probably looking to make the ugly subject matter a little more palatable by using the scenes where Scott's character impersonates a porn producer as "fish-out-of-water" comic relief. That Scott combines the tragic and comic aspects of the character so well makes this one of his best performances in my eyes.

[LastMinit]

I actually found the ending to be quite bleak too.

Spoiler

There's something downbeat to the ending for me, and I took at as a failed Christian redemption. The daughter did feel inept to me, and unsalvageable. If I had to imagine their familial future, I don't see Scott and his daughter being able to reconnect, mostly because of the daughter's behavior. Even if she's still alive, to me, their relationship will only be on palliative care and will spiral down again quickly (though probably not as bad).

Spoiler

There's also the doom of the Niki character. All the cynical outcomes projected for her future by Peter Boyle come true, with the spectre of 'Granville' looming. The daughter is purposely out of focus throughout the film, she's not picked out at the beginning, and only becomes important to her father through her absence. The scene in the cellar at the end brings her to life a little bit, but she is all the things the narrative demands - weak, impressionable, untethered - and yes I think the road ahead can only be full of contradictions. She has an alternative to the street, but Niki, the character both the father and the audience has come to know, has none, no matter what.

I've been watching this a lot in recent years, and again last light. I'm taken with Michael Chapman's work on it, very naturally documenting the backdrop, contrasting Grand Rapids with Cali, using exteriors too detailed to truly art direct, using wide views through windows when we're not trapped in the partitioned boxes of the sex shops. Maybe it's just the age I grew up, but there's something about 1970s America in 1970s film stock. I wanna say, as an outsider, it comes across like a nation as a teenager, fresh and energetic, even when looking at the sordid underbelly of it all in a film like this. I haven't watched the Chapman doc on the disc yet, I'm gonna put it on later today.