Details

Release year: 1990

Storyline

The head of a cyborg reactivates, rebuilds itself, and goes on a violent rampage in a space marine's girlfriend's apartment.

Top credits

Directors

Richard Stanley

Writers

Cast

Dylan McDermott — Moses Baxter
Stacey Travis — Jill
John Lynch — Shades
Carl McCoy — Nomad, Zone Tripper

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Did you know

• The nomad who unearths the MARK-13 robot is played by Carl McCoy, lead singer of the goth rock band Fields of the Nephilim, for whom Richard Stanley had previously directed two music videos and designed an album cover. According to him, McCoy's character in "Hardware" is basically the same as it was in the Nephilim work. The character, then titled Preacher Man, had a prosthetic hand, yellow contact lenses and wore an old black coat with a cowboy hat.

• According to Stanley, Vernon's death was supposed to be one of the movie's nastiest moments: he was originally meant to get shot in the abdomen, then cut up with a chainsaw while he was still alive. Paul McKenzie had a page in the script of screaming and begging as his spine was severed so he couldn't move, beseeching Jill to help him, with the droid basically using him as bait to get her. The scene wasn't shot because it would have taken two days and the production was at the end of the schedule, so it was decided to shoot Vernon in the head. The scene was supposed to make Chief's comment after the chess match ["Machines don't understand sacrifice... and neither do morons!"] foreshadowing of Vernon's fate.

• The band that Jill watches on TV while she makes the sculpture is Gwar, though the music is Ministry's "Stigmata".