BlazeLime Strong and Moving!

Fluentiama Perfect cast and a good story

PlatinumRead Just so...so bad

Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

SnoopyStyle John Sedley (Mickey Rourke) is derisively called Johnny Handsome for his disfigured face. During a jewel store robbery in New Orleans, he is double-crossed by fellow criminals Sunny Boyd (Ellen Barkin) and Rafe Garrett (Lance Henriksen). with his friend dead, he is sentenced to five years of hard time. Rafe tries to get him killed in prison but he still refuses to give Rafe up to police Lt. A.Z. Drones (Morgan Freeman). The newspaper falsely reports his death. Dr. Steven Fisher (Forest Whitaker) gives him an experimental surgery to fix his face and give him a new life. With his new face and new name Mitchell, he goes straight with a regular shipyard job and sweet girl Donna McCarty (Elizabeth McGovern) but revenge is always close to his mind.Before there was Face/Off, there was Johnny Handsome. I'm kidding. I'm not really comparing the two. The premise has its predecessors. This movie does need a better title. Johnny Handsome sounds silly. It should be closer to Pretty Boy Floyd. This movie is also an overlap between the two phases of Mickey Rourke's career. He's the troubled dark pretty leading man from his early days. He's also the malfigured worn down character from The Wrestler. As for the caper, I don't think Sunny would allow the money to leave her sight. There are a couple of questionable moves by some of the characters. It needs a bit of cleanup with the last act.

Predrag This is a latter-day noir masterpiece, far too low-key, grimy, and pessimistic to get the respect it deserved the first time around, but thanks to Amazon, maybe it is now getting the reappraisal it richly deserves. If memory serves correctly, Roger Ebert was one of the few critics to understand how good this thing was during its initial run. A moody, somber revenge films that recalls the film noir of the 40's. Great cast led by Rourke as the disfigured ironically named "cheap crook" of the title. A crook who is wronged and uses a controversial facial surgery to seek revenge against the scumbags that killed Johnny's friend, framed him and tried to kill him twice.Director Walter Hill was on a tear in the late 70's until the mid 80's (with a certain revival period in the 90's, when he dipped his toe into the Western Genre). This movie features several actors at the peak of their powers, including Morgan Freeman (before he was typecast as a good-natured, paternalistic friend (i.e. in "The Bucket List" or "Shawshank Redemption"). Ellen Barkin and Lance Henriksen are suitably over the top, and Forrest Whitaker inhabits his character with compassion and sensitivity. The only possible weak link is a miscast Elizabeth McGovern doing a painfully bad Cajun/Creole accent. The city of New Orleans (previously featured in Hill's "Hard Times" with Charles Bronson) is also a strong presence throughout. Overall rating: 8 out of 10.

NateWatchesCoolMovies Walter Hill's bluesy, melancholic crime thriller Johnny Handsome is a grimy concoction of violent heists and brutal shootouts held together by a character study of facially deformed career criminal John Sedley (Mickey Rourke). Sedley, looking like a cross between the elephant man and an orc, is a withdrawn, awkward outsider whose only success has been in illegal activities. Him and his partner (Scott Wilson) hook up with evil pair of dirtbags Rafé Garett (Lance Henriksen) and Sunny Boyd (Ellen Barkin) to pull off a jewelry store job. They get double crossed by the no good shitheels, his partner winds up dead, and Johnny gets caught. As part of an experimental program, Johnny undergoes a procedure to have his face altered to look normal. It's a success, and with a new face, Johnny gets parole, a legit job and begins to start anew. However, the bloody betrayal still haunts him, and slowly he starts to want revenge. This film lives in the snappy world of garish, larger than life criminals and hard nosed, mean spirited cops, a heightened, slimy version of the action genre that Hill delivers like the pro he is. Moody blues, smoky, detritus stained alleyways and the ever present vibe of the seedy side of New Orleans permeate every alcove of this piece, giving it a distinct, off noir flavor. Rourke nails the transformation from out casted freak into alpha dog slick tough guy like a caterpillar emerging from its cocoon, making us feel for Johnny despite his sordid lifestyle. Henriksen is a preening, sickening monster as street rat Garrett, a high strung, sadistic degenerate that will shoot his mother in the face if he thought he'd get a dollar and a smoke out of it. Barkin is a snake, oozing sluttiness and petulant, psychotic damaged goods charm from every whiny drawl and coy little grimace, the ultimate bad girl. Morgan Freeman turns up in a rare tough guy turn, as A.Z. Drones, the uptight cop who sees nothing but trash in Johnny and has no hope for any change. Freeman's reaction to Johnny's new face is one of sarcastic, stunned hilarity and is a career best scene from him. Forest Whitaker makes an appearance as the sympathetic doctor in charge of the operation, and Elizabeth Mcgovernn is a welcome breath of fresh air from the greasy rogues gallery, as a nice girl he meets at his legit job. This gritty yarn waltzes in straight from a dime store novella, and Hill knows how to guide it just this side of silly, with just the right amount of cheeky pulp, grounded writing, rambunctious, blood soaked shootouts, and well, bold drawn characterizations.

Vivekmaru45 A man who is double-crossed by his partners, imprisoned and who is then knifed while in prison by a man paid by his partners.This man survives the knife-attack, gets a new face and a new identity. Now he knows, that hidden behind his new face he can pass undetected among those who tried to destroy him...This film is more than revenge flick. It shows a man with a severe facial deformity mocked by others as "Johnny Handsome." When he has plastic surgery performed on his face and later sees his new face, he has mixed feelings of both disbelief and exhilaration. Now he is no long stigmatized as a freak and can lead a normal life. He lands an honest job and begins seeing Donna McCarty, a respectable woman who knows little of his past. But in his way are the people who tried to kill him in prison. Overall: I'm at a loss to see why this film wasn't a Box Office success. I'm a big Lance Henriksen fan and in this film he plays his menacing best. Similar to the role he played in Jean Claude Van Damme film: Hard Target. Veteran actress Alen Barkin complements him well. For once Mickey Rourke does a good role in his part as the titular character Johnny. Verdict: Definitely a MUST BUY!Similar revenge films: Payback, For A Few Dollars More, Robocop, Zero Tolerance, Face/Off, and Commando.