Hellbound

I sort of surprised myself when I came to the realization that I had never actually seen a Chuck Norris movie prior to Hellbound. After watching this biblical horror actioner, I don't know if I am likely to seek out any additional entries in his oeuvre. I want to make myself clear- Hellbound does a fine job at being a very watchable bad movie...its just that Norris, despite his internet meme status, is sort of a charisma vacuum. Hellbound features Norris past his physical prime (though it has its quota of slow-mo roundhouses), so you would hope he'd compensate by cracking wise a bit more. The mulleted one doesn't even play it as laughably intense as Van Damme or Seagal would have done.

Norris leaves the wise-cracking to his sidekick, Jackson ("Hey! The cabbie from Adventures in Babysitting"). He gets to deliver lines (as club member Jimmy observed) like “I’m so hungry, I could eat the south end of a north bound skunk” and “either this guys nuttier than a Snickers or we’re in some heavy duty s*** here”
Somehow its within their jurisdiction to travel to Jerusalem to solve a (demonic) Chicago murder. I don't understand how our legal system worked back in 1994- so why not!

Hellbound is a much more successful ironic watch than our last selection- we get some slant-eyed demons, cornrows, freeze frames, roundhouse kicks, lame synthesizer music, and...Jesus?

I want to believe all the above are trademarks of director Aaron Norris. I want to believe it so badly in fact that I probably won't watch another of his movies to disprove this thought.
By the way-Aaron Norris has directed 10 movies...guess who they all star.
Frank Stallone owes less to nepotism.

We've gotten some good comments about Hellbound so far in the Black Eagle posting- so please check them out. Club Member Brady actually pointed out what became my favorite moment in the movie:
"Jackson attempts to tackle Prosatanos (a Greek name, perhaps?) as they scramble for the magical sceptre, and falls hilariously short. "



In SLOW MOTION!!! It was glorious and I may not have given it a second thought if Brady hadn't commented- so please leave your comment and share your funny observations on the film.

Topic for discussion- Where does Norris fall in your list of action heroes?

As posted earlier, our next film will be Krull- a film I remember fondly because of the Atari game.