Amazon.co.uk Review
If it weren't for the fact that John Boorman's Point Blank was already a definitive take on Richard Stark's novel The Hunter (reissued under the title Payback), Payback would be a well-above-average 90s action movie. The original toughness is diluted: Mel Gibson's Porter, replacing Lee Marvin's Walker and Stark's Parker, comes on like a hardnut but turns into a softie when he hooks up with call-girl Maria Bello (and he even likes dogs). Double-crossed and wounded after shifty Gregg Henry dupes Porter's wife (Deborah Kara Unger) into betraying him, Porter sets out to get back the $70,000 share of a heist that he feels he is owed. Because Henry has used the money to buy his way into "the Outfit", he has to deal not only with the squirming scumbag but a hierarchy of corporate mobsters (William Devane, James Coburn, Kris Kristofferson) for whom it would be bad business practice to hand over even the trivial sum. Director-writer Brian Helgeland gives it a steely-blue look and gets good performances all round (with room for Lucy Liu as an amusing dominatrix) while constructing a story in which everything fits. But it's just a good thriller, since the masterpiece potential has already been staked out. --Kim Newman
Video Description
DVD Special Features
Interactive Menus
Scene Access
Interview Clips with M. Gibson, M. Bello, L. Liu, J. Coburn
Language in Dolby Digital 5.1: English
Subtitles: English/Arabic/Bulgarian/English for the hearing impaired
From the Back Cover
The pay off is excitement when Mel Gibson portrays hard-boiled Porter in Payback, a fast, frequently funny and ecstatically twisted blend of action and noir atmosphere co-written and directed by Brian Helgeland, Academy Award winner for L.A. Confidential. Porter makes his living outside the law. So when his partners in a heist rip off his $70,000 share and leave him for dead, there's only one way for Porter to settle things: his way. And that sends him on a vendetta that will have a lot of lowlifes gaping at the talking end of Porter's fat revolver. Crooked cops, Street gangs, Spineless flyspecks, Crime bosses. Anyone and everyone standing between Porter and his 70 grand are going to know he's backwith a vengeance.
