The specialist
Year of release : 1994
Run time : 1h50m
Genre : Action / Thriller
Cast : Sylvester Stallone, Sharon Stone, James Woods, Eric Roberts
The movie is loosely based on the John Shirley series of novels of the same name.
Ray is a freelance hitman. He is listening to the recordings of the calls May Munro made to him, as she is trying to convince him to accept her offer of k1lling the men who k1lled her family when she was a kid.
Because Ray is not convinced, as he likes to make sure the person is for real, and not messing with him, May goes in by herself, posing as Adrian Hastings.
Ray follows May around, listening to her calls.
May catches the eye of the organized crime syndicate boss’ son, Tomas. May can barely fake her liking him, as whenever he touches her she remembers him k1lling her parents.
May is consumed with the need for vengeance.
Seeing her with Tomas, Ray finally agrees to k1ll him, his father, and one of their men. Ray is an explosives specialist, meaning he can make a b0mb out of anything he has around.
Tomas’ father, Joe Leon, hired the 2nd best explosives specialist in the field, Ned Trent, to oversee his protection, online and in person.
As Ray accepts the job, and takes down the man working for Joe Leon, Ned is infiltrated in the local police by their superior who is working for Leon, as he knows it’s Ray and he wants to catch him.
After he takes down Tomas too, and Ray thinks he also k1lled May as she walked into the room with him, we see that nothing is at it seems, as May is working with Ned. She contacted Ray because Ned wanted to draw him out, as Ned wants vengeance on him for losing his job in the CIA.
But what if there’s more than meets the eye when it comes to May?
I enjoyed the movie. It’s action packed, and it even has a twist when we think we got it all figured out.
Sharon Stone was beautiful. One thing I didn’t like was, I don’t know who was in charge of her hair, because they gave her a sort of bad straight haircut, to the point she always looked like she didn’t brush her hair. She also smokes a lot, when she puts out a cigarette she starts another. Her character is consumed by the need to avenge her family.
In the beginning I was wondering why didn’t she find a hitman who could have just sh0t them or at least make their d3aths look like an accident, but the plot twist makes it make sense, explaining the Why.
Ray is haunted by a mission he had with Ned, in which an innocent girl died due to their explosives.
Ned wants vengeance on Ray for their last mission together, in which Ray wanted to pull the plug after seeing the kid, but Ned didn’t care for it. He considers him responsible for being fired by the CIA, and not being able to find a job in the field.
Tomas is a man who is used to getting what he wants, and not hearing No for an answer.He expects everyone to do whatever he wants, and that includes the women he wants , as in, if he likes a woman, he expects her to be his because he wants her. No is not in his vocabulary.
The acting was good. I noticed the critics didn’t like Sharon’s acting, but I think in the context of her being consumed by vengeance and hating the man she’s dating just to get her vengeance on him, and her being a normal woman, who is not good at faking it, her acting makes sense. You can tell whenever she’s around Tomas, that she doesn’t like him and she hates him. Not to mention, Tomas didn’t give her a choice, he’s forcing her to date him, so..how would you feel if you were forced to date someone? Could you fake liking them?
The soundtrack was Ok.
The visual effects and explosions were good.
The movie grossed a little over 170 million dollars at the box office, against a budget of 45 million dollars.
Steven Seagal was offered the role before Stallone and the director job, but he wanted 9 million dollars and wasn’t Ok with the s3x scenes.
The movie holds a rating of under 30% on Rotten Tomatoes from the critics and the audience, and a 5.6 rating on IMDB.
The movie was nominated for 5 Golden Raspberry Awards (Worst Picture, Worst Actor for Sylvester Stallone, Worst Actress for Sharon Stone (winning it), Worst Screen Couple for Stallone and Stone (winning it), and Worst Supporting Actor for Rod Steiger ), and 4 Stinkers Bad Movies Awards for Worst Picture, Worst Actor for both Stallone and Steiger, and Worst Actress for Sharon Stone, who also won.
Viewer discretion is advised, as the movie contains nudity.
You can watch the full movie for free on the Ok.Ru platform, in English or dubbed in Russian.
Rating : Could have been a contender !