Ildikó Szücs in Redline (1997)

Pics

Review

I really like this unknown little Rutger Hauer sci fi flick. Shit, I've watched it about four times already (including capping time). 4.7 out of 10 on the IMDb reader poll. Pitiful. Do movie watcher expect every sci fi flick to have the budget of a Star Wars or a Matrix?

Take it for what it is...a small budget sci fi flick filmed in Hungary by a Hungarian who has lived and worked in Canada for 25 years or so. The star's a bit washed up but I guess the director was hoping that his name would draw some viewers.

Redline was released as Redline here in the US and as Deathline elsewhere. Why the name change for our market? Who knows? I kind of prefer "Redline" myself so it works out OK for me. Written and directed by one Tibor Takács, who's (as mentioned above) a Hungarian born filmmaker living in Canada for the past 25-30 years churning out sci fi flicks and working on TV shows such as Sabrina, The Crow, Earth:Final Conflict and even an episode of Red Shoe Diaries.

Now, IMDb says that Redline is an American flick and All-Movie Guide says its an American/Dutch movie but the credits suggest that it's a Canadian/Hungarian movie.

Strengths:

Good story, female nudity, lot's of gunfire and explosions, a cameo by a couple of bad ass Mil Hind copters and Yvonne Scio.

Weaknesses:

Rutger. I like old Rutger but he could be drunk through out this one. He's supposed to be an American but his accent is atrocious.

Here's the story: 92 year old Rutger Hauer plays John Anderson Wade, an ex-CIA man who is now a black market entrepreneur in the capitalist Wild Wild West of Moscow in the near future.

Rutger and his girlfriend Yvonne Scio and his Agency buddy Merrick (some guy who plays on The Crow) are smuggling illegal "fantasy" biochips into Russia to sell to cyberjunkies (wasn't "Strange Days" about something like that?) to stick in their transdermal transcranial USB port and do the cyberpunk thing.

Rutger's partner Merrick betrays him and shoots him and his galpal dead at a rendezvous point. Anyway...Rutger and his gal are dead and his partner Merrick is working for the Troika, which in real life is a generic term for Russian organized crime groups but in this flick it's a cohesive organization much like "The Mafia" is some US movies.

The Russians are doing some experiments on "bio-synthetic cyber implants" and they use their research to bring old Rutger back to life. Rutger awakens and escapes and seeks revenge against Merrick. He goes to the Ministry of Culture, which is now a big state run brothel, and gets him a whore.

It's real muddy here as to why he sought her out. She looks EXACTLY like his old dead girlfriend (played by Yvonne Scio of course) and I believe that Rutger thinks it is her. He wants info from her as to where Merrick can be found.

I still don't know if she was REALLY his old girlfriend (who's death would've had to have been faked) or if she was planted by the CIA (you did find out at the end that she's CIA) because she looked like his old gal or perhaps even that she had her look altered to look like the dead girl. I still just don't know.

Written by: Mongoose ...courtesy of Scoppy.net