Hardcore Henry header

While we get a handful of videogame adaptations this year, including Warcraft and Assassin’s Creed, we imagine few will actually replicate the experience like Ilya Naishuller‘s Hardcore. Produced by Timur Bekmambetov and starring Sharlto Copley, Danila Kozlovsky, Haley Bennet, Andrey Dementiev, Dasha Charusha, and Sveta Ustinova, it follows a cybernetic super-soldier who kicks, punches and parkours his way across Russia to save his wife from a psychotic paramilitary psychic bent on world domination. And it’s entirely in first-person point-of-view.

We said in our review, “While perhaps not presented in a stylistic manner friendly to most Vulgar Auteurists, the film manages to pull off a hat-trick of comparisons to the movement’s deities. The rough-and-tumble cyborg mayhem recalls John Hyams’ Universal Soldier pictures, the final fight of hundreds of indistinguishable robot cronies is inevitably similar to a recent Paul W.S. Anderson film, and — even if not capturing their pure energy — there’s song-and-dance number featuring multiple robot clones that can’t help but make one think of a similar sequence from Neveldine/Taylor’s excellent 2009 feature Gamer.”

Ahead of a nationwide release in April, check out the new trailer and poster below.

Strap in. HARDCORE HENRY is one of the most unflinchingly original wild-rides to hit the big screen in a long time: You remember nothing. Mainly because you’ve just been brought back from the dead by your wife (Haley Bennett). She tells you that your name is Henry. Five minutes later, you are being shot at, your wife has been kidnapped, and you should probably go get her back. Who’s got her? His name’s Akan (Danila Kozlovsky); he’s a powerful warlord with an army of mercenaries, and a plan for world domination. You’re also in an unfamiliar city of Moscow, and everyone wants you dead. Everyone except for a mysterious British fellow called Jimmy (Sharlto Copley). He may be on your side, but you aren’t sure. If you can survive the insanity, and solve the mystery, you might just discover your purpose and the truth behind your identity. Good luck, Henry. You’re likely going to need it…

Hardcore Henry poster

Hardcore Henry opens on April 8th.

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