Hardcore Henry

Ilya Naishuller grew this out of the first person GoPro videos he made for his own band, Biting Elbows: Bad Motherfucker and The Stampede. The camera is a GoPro Hero3 carried in a helmet rig built for the production, sitting at mouth level, and that height is the key decision. It keeps Henry’s own chest and arms inside the frame, so the image reads as a body rather than an eye floating through rooms. A magnet based system softens the shake without truly stabilising it; all it takes out are the small fluctuations of walking. The unbroken feel is largely assembled afterwards, too. The motorway chase looks like a single continuous take but was built from 43 separate plates. More than a dozen operators and stunt performers wore the mask, over ten people played Henry, and Naishuller appears in the mirror reflections. Since Henry never speaks, every piece of exposition is handed to Sharlto Copley’s Jimmy, who keeps returning in a new version. The film screened at Toronto under the title Hardcore and won the Midnight Madness audience award. A good fit if you accept a camera tied to one head and a plot kept behind that constraint. Not for anyone who needs a steady frame or gets queasy when the image follows head movement; there is no relief shot.