Bullet

"You only get one shot at revenge."

1996 1h 40m EN

😐

6.2

MID

⭐

6.4

IMDB

★6.2TMDB · 139★6.4IMDB · 9,099

ActionDramaThrillerCrime

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

A tough, Jewish ex-con just released from prison crosses a powerful drug dealer and former prison rival in his return to a life of crime.

“You only get one shot at revenge.”

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Cast

Mickey Rourke
Butch 'Bullet' Stein
Tupac Shakur
Tank
Adrien Brody
Ruby Stein
Ted Levine
Louis Stein
Matthew Powers
Paddy
Donnie Wahlberg
Big Balls
Suzanne Shepherd
Cookie Stein
Jerry Grayson
Sol Stein

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Julien Temple
Writers: Mickey Rourke, Bruce Rubenstein
Languages: English
Countries: United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 6

ERA

Did you know

30 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 6

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Julien Temple, shot by Crescenzo G.P. Notarile. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 6

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Niven Howie shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 6

CAST

Did you know

Mickey Rourke and Tupac Shakur and Adrien Brody carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 6

FACT

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "You only get one shot at revenge.".

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 6

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt0115781 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Julien Temple directs. Crescenzo G.P. Notarile behind the camera. Niven Howie cuts. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

130 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
2Directed by Julien Temple, shot by Crescenzo G.P. Notarile. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
3Editor Niven Howie shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
4Mickey Rourke and Tupac Shakur and Adrien Brody carry the top of the cast.
5Marketing tagline: "You only get one shot at revenge.".
6IMDB entry: tt0115781 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
7Classified under 15 themes, including "drug abuse", "burglar", "dysfunctional family", "rape victim".

The technical file

Cinematography: Crescenzo G.P. Notarile
Editing: Niven Howie
Production design: Christopher Nowak
Makeup / hair: Ed French
Sound: Elmo Weber
Stunt coordinator: Frank Ferrara Sr.
Runtime: 100 min · 1h 40m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Original language: EN
Certification (US): R
IMDB: Bullet (1996)
IMDB rating: 6.4/10 · 9,099 votes
MPAA: R

Also by

Julien Temple

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Trailers & featurettes

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Community reviews

What people are saying

tmdb280390232022-09-10
★ 5/10
Bullet is a shot in the dark; a stray bullet that almost hits its mark. Almost. It's hard to screw up a film with Mickey Rourke, Tupac Shakur, Adrien Brody, and Ted Levine – hard, but not impossible. One of the most disappointing aspects of Bullet is that Shakur, the rare musician with a truly solid screen presence, only appears in a handful of scenes – which is still more than enough for him to steal the movie –, and only shares a couple of them with Rourke. One can only wonder if his death that same year had something to do with this. Butch 'Bullet' Stein (Rourke) is out on parole after serving an eight-year sentence. On his first day out, Bullet stabs Flaco (Manny Perez), who works for drug dealer Tank (Shakur), in the eye. Apparently, stabbing people in the eye is Bullet's trademark, and Tank is one of his previous victims. So why is his nickname Bullet, then? And why does Tank wear an eye patch? Under it, he either has a glass eye, or a glassy eye, but an eye nonetheless. It’s symptomatic of this script, in which Rourke had a hand, that the consequences fall very short of the magnitude of the actions that provoke them. In addition to Tank's eye, we have Butch's younger brother Ruby’s (Brody) hand. Ruby is an aspiring graffiti artist whose “drawing hand” is impaled with a knife, for which Butch is indirectly to blame. This incident not only does not result in friction between the brothers, but it doesn’t prevent Ruby from painting a huge mural of his hand with a blade going through it, of all things. Basically, this event belongs in a first draft, not in the finished movie. All things considered, I have mixed feelings about this film. Tupac is easily the best thing in it; when he's not there we expect him to show up, and when he shows up, all eyes are on him (you’ll excuse the obvious reference). The filmmakers should have given us a lot more of Shakur, or a lot less. Rourke, on the other hand, gives a deliberately lethargic and morose performance, befitting the unmotivated Butch – who is only jolted out of his drug-induced stupor to commit petty crimes to get money to buy more drugs –, and in keeping with the scattered, disjointed, and episodic nature of much of the film. The highlight of Rourke's performance is a great scene in which Butch warns two young men he mugged earlier in the story of the dangers of ending up like him. This Butch material, which could have been the American answer to Trainspotting, is set against the more straightforward Tank subplot, so that we are left with two different stories running perpendicular, rather than parallel, to each other, and when they intersect is more of a train wreck than a junction.

Production companies