★★★★★ 3
Dated, but....
Compared to the novel on which it is based, this movie is a complete letdown, so fans of the Parker series of novels who are drawn to this book may want to think twice about watching the film if they are looking for a faithful adaptation of the first Parker novel. That being said, it was not the intention of the director John Boorman to adapt Richard Stark's excellent novel, "the Hunter" to film, but rather to create an entirely new piece of fiction from the skeleton of the original story, so one most try to judge the movie on its own merits, which is difficult to do.
As in other reviews, I must commend the directing. The style of the film is way ahead of it's time, with stark visuals, stylized fight scenes, and prolonged moments of silence. I love the long Walk lee Marvin takes thru the a multi-colored corridor where his footsteps drown out all other sound. Marvin's performance is also very strong, and he shows himself to have been an actor who took chances with his image and, in this case, used his clout to make a movie which otherwise would not have been so memorable.
In the end, one must ask the question "Why?" Why not faithfully adapt "The Hunter" into film? It certainly would not have stifled the film's creativity, and nothing in the movie's script was any better than what was in the book. There is also the annoying occurrence of changing the protagonists' name from Parker to something else; in this case, Walker. This trend continued in another six film adaptations of the Parker novels, the last of which was 1999's Payback, starring Mel Gibson as Porter.
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Reviewed in the United States on July 1, 2011
