Broken Arrow

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Broken Arrow

R

Released Feb 9, 1996

1h 48m

Action

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Tomatometer

Popcornmeter

53%

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34 Reviews

44%

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100,000+ Ratings

Air Force pilots Vic Deakins (John Travolta) and Riley Hale (Christian Slater) are sent on an overnight top-secret mission with two nuclear weapons aboard their aircraft. But, after they are in the air, Deakins changes the plan. He attempts to kill Hale and then steals the weapons with the intent of selling them to terrorists. However, Hale survives the crash and meets up with park ranger Terry Carmichael (Samantha Mathis). Together, Hale and Terry attempt to thwart Deakins' plan.

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Critics Consensus

John Woo adds pyrotechnic glaze to John Travolta's hammy performance, but fans may find Broken Arrow to be a dispiritingly disposable English-language entry for the action auteur.

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Jonathan Rosenbaum

Chicago Reader

Broken Arrow is beautifully crafted, mindless entertainment–nothing more, but also nothing less.

Jun 7, 2022

Full Review

Owen Gleiberman

Entertainment Weekly

Rated: C

Sep 7, 2011

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Mick LaSalle

San Francisco Chronicle

Rated: 3/4

Jun 18, 2002

Full Review

Robin Holabird

KUNR (Reno, NV)

The movie Broken Arrow remains rentable, while the region's monolithic cliffs still overwhelm the senses.

Jul 23, 2021

Full Review

Mike Massie

Gone With The Twins

Despite a lot of mayhem taking place on screen, the only memorable component of this ramshackle actioner is Hans Zimmer's score.

Rated: 2/10

Sep 11, 2020

Full Review

Dennis Schwartz

Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews

An inane thriller for those with a penchant for films that nuke themselves on purpose.

Rated: C

Aug 8, 2018

Full Review

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Joe M

One of the best action movies, awesome sound track, a cool movie for escapism. Good actors

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

06/19/24

Full Review

Gerald H

80ies-Scheissdreck in the 90ies.

Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars

06/05/24

Full Review

James T

Great soundtrack! Over the top action.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

03/10/24

Full Review

Aaron G

If you need something to put on to kill a couple hours, this is the movie for you. Plot feels like it was written by an Elementary student. Plenty of plot jumps and cheesy one liners. I was expecting more from John Travolta & Christian Slater. I was pleasantly surprised to hear the wilhelm scream during a concluding fight scene.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

12/27/23

Full Review

DanTheMan 2

For lack of a better phrase, Broken Arrow doesn't really feel like a John Woo movie, lacking so much of his style, influence and trademarks but it does have explosions... lots and lots of explosions. Having been gifted a larger budget, it's well-crafted but completely mindless entertainment, existing purely as a way to showcase the film's action scenes which, in all fairness, do deliver (the finale on the train being more than worth the price of admission). It seems Woo was met with even more studio interference here than with Hard Target as there's no rhyme or reason as to why any does anything, no coherency with its characters or story with empty clichéd dialogue but it's tongue in cheek amid its seriousness with Travolta, delivering as the film's villain, hamming it up to near Face/Off levels of brilliance. Meanwhile, Slater brings next to no charisma to his role and his chemistry with Samantha Mathis is non-existent, I can't be the only one thinking that Nicholas Cage would have been a way better pick for Slater's role. Despite a lot of mayhem taking place on screen, the most memorable component of this otherwise ramshackle of an actioner is Hans Zimmer's awesome score. Broken Arrow is ultimately a subdued effort, one with a lot of cheese but not a lot of energy which in turn can make it feel like a slog.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

11/21/23

Full Review

Sebastian L

Woo has absolutely no interest in what makes sense as long as there are guns and explosions. This isn't even funny bad, it's just bad.

Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars

10/26/23

Full Review

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John Woo

Director

John Travolta

Maj. Vic Deakins

Christian Slater

Capt. Riley Hale

Samantha Mathis

Terry Carmichael

Delroy Lindo

Col. Max Wilkins

Bob Gunton

Pritchett

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Synopsis

Air Force pilots Vic Deakins (John Travolta) and Riley Hale (Christian Slater) are sent on an overnight top-secret mission with two nuclear weapons aboard their aircraft. But, after they are in the air, Deakins changes the plan. He attempts to kill Hale and then steals the weapons with the intent of selling them to terrorists. However, Hale survives the crash and meets up with park ranger Terry Carmichael (Samantha Mathis). Together, Hale and Terry attempt to thwart Deakins' plan.

Director: John Woo
Producer: Mark Gordon, Terence Chang, Bill Badalato
Screenwriter: Graham Yost
Distributor: Fox, 20th Century Fox
Production Co: Mark Gordon Productions, 20th Century Fox, WCG Entertainment Productions
Rating: R
Genre: Action
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Feb 9, 1996, Original
Release Date (Streaming): Mar 1, 2013
Box Office (Gross USA): $70.6M
Runtime: 1h 48m
Sound Mix: Surround

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