Hobo With A Shotgun

After all the hype and hoopla, the recuts and extended versions, the trailers and spin-offs, finally something decent has emerged from the wreck of Quentin Tarantino’s disastrous ‘Grindhouse’ project. ‘Hobo with a Shotgun’ is no classic, but unlike its predecessors ‘Death Proof’, ‘Planet Terror’ and ‘Machete’, it’s a watchable, lively, reasonably inventive take on old-school exploitation clichés. Inspired by a competition-winning trailer originally attached to the Canadian release of ‘Grindhouse’, ‘Hobo’ stars Rutger Hauer as the titular vigilante, an isolated drifter whose fury at the criminal scum infesting the slums of Hope Town sparks double-barrelled vengeance. It’s clearly a low-budget affair, but first-time director Eisener compensates with super-saturated ’70s-style colour, a cracking John Carpenter-meets-blaxploitation soundtrack, hyper-speed cutting and fountains of crowd-pleasing gore: heads roll, limbs fly, and one poor soul gets both barrels in the balls. But the trump card is Hauer, whose terse, growling performance anchors the film – though it does have the unwanted effect of making the rest of the cast look somewhat amateurish. Sick but fun.