Hurricane Smith (1992)

 

Synopsis: Coasting on the spectacular box-office success of Action Jackson, Carl Weathers mugs his way through a low-budget Ozploitation shoot-em-up. 

Blurb From the VHS Jacket: “Carl Weathers is Hurricane Smith. He’ll blow you away.”

What Did I Learn?: 1) Apparently, Australian cops only show up when you call them. You can apparently shoot at a bus full of tourists on a busy boulevard and then crash your car into a fast food joint and you’ll never see Melbourne’s finest. 2) Australians refer to Americans as “septics,” and they’re still pissed off at them for unknown reasons going back to the Second World War. . 

You Might Like This Movie If: You assume from the title that you're in for a 90-minute music video. 

Really?: 1) See: “What Did I Learn?” #1 2) Um….the lady on the VHS jacket doesn’t look much like Cassandra Delaney, who plays Weathers’ love interest Julie. 3) So, the bad guys give Hurricane a super-duper beating, throw him out of a moving car, and he’s pretty much ok, except for some initially wobbly movements. It’s a good thing he doesn’t have a concussion or any cracked ribs! 4) Wait, Smith and his buddies have stormed Dowd’s compound, the cops are en route, so Dowd thinks this is the perfect time to ice his rather whiny mistress? That scenes makes no sense. 5) It seems a bit anticlimactic that we never meet Hurricane’s sister, and we’re never given a definitive answer about her fate; ok, Dowd asserts near the end that she was murdered, but he’s locked in a life-or-death struggle with Hurricane at the time, and it’s plausible he makes this claim only to mentally attack his opponent. 

Rating: Jurgen Prochnow does a great job of making drug dealer Charlie Dowd a truly menacing villain (although I don’t know why an Australian gangster would have a noticeable German accent), but Hurricane Smith is otherwise a very pedestrian low-energy Aussie thriller that doesn’t really go anywhere. I cannot recommend this movie. 4.5/10 stars. 

Would it Work For a Bad Movie Night?: Sure! Take a drink any time somebody addresses Hurricane with: “You Americans.” 

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099814/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0