Synopsis
Mark 13 is a government-built killing machine programmed with artificial intelligence, able to repair and recharge itself from any energy source. Through a series of coincidences, the cyborg's head ends up in the home of a sculptress as a bizarre Christmas present from her boyfriend. Once inside its new home, the cyborg promptly reconstructs the rest of its body using a variety of household utensils and proceeds to go on a murderous rampage.
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Cast
- Dylan McDermottMoses "Hard Mo" Baxter
- Stacey TravisJill
- John LynchShades
- William HootkinsLincoln Wineberg Jr.
- Carl McCoyNomad
- Iggy PopAngry Bob
- Mark NorthoverAlvy
- Paul McKenzieVernon
- Oscar JamesChief
- LemmyTaxi Driver
Recommendations
- 80
Empire
A little slow and vastly outdated now, but nonetheless very watchable. - 63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
To his credit, writer-director Richard Stanley, a South African native now living in England, brings his own bloody specialties to the banquet, and Hardware, although neither original nor especially thought-provoking, does serve its intended purpose by sending the hungry horror film fan away from the table satiated and nauseated. Compliments to the chefs. [12 Oct 1990] - 50
Variety
Hardware veers loonily out of control and becomes a black comic exercise in F/X tour-deforce that’s ceaselessly pushing itself over the top. - 50
Boston Globe
The chief trouble with Hardware is that it doesn't seem to contribute anything uniquely its own to the genre, although it works hard dismembering bodies and otherwise crushing and tearing them apart with its circular saw and drill-bit arms after homing in on them with its ruby laser eyes. [14 Sep 1990, p.40p] - 50
Chicago Tribune
Though it does know how to hammer home a point, Hardware doesn't always have matching nuts and bolts. It has an anarchic quality, a jolting, disorienting rhythm that makes us unsure of time frame in certain stretches and of motivation in others. [14 Sep 1990, p.I] - 50
Miami Herald
It's one of those movies made by hard-core techies, meticulous about the "period" details and utterly neglectful of pretty much everything else, including such nuances as plain old plot. [15 Sep 1990, p.E6] - 37
Washington Post
While it's obvious that Stanley has seen a lot of genre films, he's not yet learned how to make one, though his shortcomings are less visual than dramatic and narrative; things look fast, but happen s-l-o-w. This Hardware needs a grease job. - 33
Entertainment Weekly
Had the killer droid been conceived as a charismatic demon, Hardware might have delivered some B-movie kicks. As it is, there’s nothing particularly scary or awesome about this low-tech walking junk pile. It’s as if someone had remade Alien with the monster played by a rusty erector set.
