Hellfire Review: Stephen Lang kicks ass as nameless hero in this action flick

Plot: A haunted ex–Green Beret drifter wanders into a Southern town ruled by a ruthless crime boss and a corrupt sheriff. When violence erupts, the Man wages a one-man war for justice, redemption, and the soul of a broken town.

Review: The wandering stranger who comes into town and saves the helpless citizens from their tormenters may be a cliche, but it is also a tried and true formula that works when you have the right actor in the role of the hero. Stephen Lang has become known for playing villains, thanks to his iconic turn as Quaritch in James Cameron’s Avatar films, as Norman Nordstrom in the Don’t Breathe movies, and, most recently, as the antagonist in Sisu: Road to Revenge. While Lang has played both good guys and bad guys for forty years, his aptitude for action movies has never been stronger. Even now at seventy-three, Stephen Lang is proving once again that he is more than up to the task of kicking ass and taking names, and does so with style in the new action movie Hellfire. Co-starring Dolph Lundgren and Harvey Keitel, Hellfire is a decent action vehicle that cuts through the fluff to deliver a bare-knuckle and violent action movie.

Hellfire keeps things simple. The film opens with a drifter passing through a small town and stopping there, where he offers to work in exchange for food. While instantly recognized as a veteran, the drifter refuses charity and insists on working for his meal. Right off the bat, local sheriff Wiley (Dolph Lundgren) tells the drifter that strangers aren’t welcome, and we realize something is up in this community. A man named Jeremiah (Harvey Keitel) lords over the town as his personal slave army, who help him with his illegal activities, and the presence of this drifter poses a risk to his operation. Nevertheless, the drifter meets local saloon owner Owen (Chris Mullinax) and his daughter Lena (Scottie Thompson), who nickname the stranger “Nomada” and let him stay for the night. That angers Jeremiah’s son, Clyde (Michael Sirow), but Nomada has decided to defend Owen, Lena, and the townsfolk and goes to war with the criminal syndicate.

At a brief ninety-five minutes, Hellfire wastes little time on subplots or excess story, which leads to some clumsy moments that try to hint at Nomada’s time as a Green Beret and that he may suffer from PTSD. Through vague dreams of a botched mission to close-ups on Nomada’s copy of the Bible, we get the sense that this drifter is battling his own demons, but that goes away when the ass-kickings begin. Because Hellfire is a low-budget affair, the fights are limited to hand-to-hand combat and a couple of car chase sequences, but they work thanks to Lang’s physical presence. For a seventy-year-old, Lang still has some moves and faces off against Clyde, Jeremiah’s lead henchman Zeke (Johnny Yong Bosch), and countless generic thugs tossed his way. The fights are heavily choreographed, but they took me back to the halcyon days of Chuck Norris, Jean-Claude Van Damme, and every other early-90s action hero.

While I expected the overall direction of this movie, I was surprised by some of the narrative choices. Hellfire lives up to its name with brutal and unapologetic violence that caught me off guard. While Nomada is a defender of the town and Jeremiah and his cronies are clearly bad guys, where this story heads in the final act genuinely surprised me. There is a twist to the story that I saw coming a mile away, and I am not convinced it works within the film, but we watch movies like this for the action and to see familiar actors chew the scenery. Harvey Keitel and Dolph Lundgren both have limited screentime here, but they are fun to watch when they are on screen. Neither actor gets too involved with the action sequences, but their nostalgic presence makes up for it. The heaviest lifting is handled by Lang, along with Michael Sirow, who plays Clyde as the physical presence that Keitel can no longer provide in action scenes, while Johnny Yong Bosch echoes great lead henchmen with facial hair like Commando‘s Bennett. The fight between Lang and Bosch is a highlight of Hellfire.

Written by Richard Lowry, editor and scripter of President Evil, Savage Creatures, and Seized, this movie is exactly the type of flick often found filling Redbox kiosks outside supermarkets and convenience stores. I have prejudged countless of these movies as not worth the disc space they take up, but every now and then there is a gem that peeks through the crap. Director Isaac Florentine (Undisputed 2 and Undisputed 3) uses what he has at his disposal to make Hellfire punch above its weight and deliver an enjoyable action experience. Florentine has directed military-themed movies, which help give the combat sequences here some energy and aptitude that looks good on screen. He also makes great use of his cast, which is predominantly over sixty-five, but they never feel elderly on screen. The energy level is not quite what Liam Neeson brings to his projects, but it still works better than expected.

While it can be a bit too on the nose, like with the “Wayfaring Stranger”-inspired score by Stephen Edwards, Hellfire is a quick, brutal action movie that is far darker than I expected. Stephen Lang comes off as a solid action hero who could be decades younger, given how mobile he is on-screen. I would have liked the ending to feel a little more earned, but I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing Nomada return for sequels that find Stephen Lang drifting into more towns and taking down the bad guys holding innocent people hostage. Hellfire is a quick watch that will keep you entertained from the first punch to the last explosion, even if you have seen it all before.

Hellfire opens on digital and PVOD on February 17th.