Main Cast: Mickey Rourke, Tupac Shakur, Ted Levine, Adrien Brody, John Enos
Release Year: 1995
Country: US
Run Time: 93 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Plot
Seven years after his comedy Earth Girls Are Easy (1988), former music video director Julien Temple returned to feature films with the direct-to-video crime melodrama Bullet (1995), which featured a fine supporting cast. Mickey Rourke stars as Butch "Bullet" Stein, a Jewish junkie from the mean streets of Brooklyn who is paroled after eight years in prison. Butch rips off a runner for local drug dealer, Tank (Tupac Shakur), and is soon right back into his old habits of snorting coke and shooting up heroin with his best friend Lester (John Enos III). Enraged by Butch's affront and already determined to get revenge on him for a past wrong, Tank sets about getting even with his old enemy by hiring a hulking brute, Gates (Ray Mancini) to beat Butch. When the confrontation occurs, however, Gates breaks his hand on the battle-hardened Butch. Besides Lester, the only people in Butch's corner are his two brothers, the mentally-unhinged Vietnam War veteran Louis (Ted Levine) and aspiring artist Ruby (Adrien Brody), neither of whom can be counted on to help him in the inevitable showdown. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
Mickey Rourke was also the music supervisor of the film. It had limited distribution in theatres in US and was shot in New York with a significant portion in Brooklyn.
Bullet is the story of Butch "Bullet" Stein (Rourke), who leaves prison after serving an 8-year term. But he soon ends up going back to his old ways when he rips off a heroin dealer and falls back into his old drug habits. He returns home to his dysfunctionalJewish family, including his mentally ill, Vietnam-veteran brother Louis (Ted Levine), and esteemed artist brother Ruby (Adrien Brody). Bullet's father is in constant disappointment of his three sons, and criticizes Bullet for throwing his life away regardless of the potential he had from baseball scholarships. As Bullet copes with his regrets and struggles with being wrapped up in his own problems, Tank (Tupac Shakur), a powerful drug lord, plots revenge on Bullet for taking his eye while together in prison. He plans to kill Bullet with an extremely potent dose of heroin, distinctive by its red rubber band. The plan is ruined when the heroin is stolen by armed men immediately after bullet buys it from a dealer. Unaware of the danger that had lay before him, Bullet continues with his criminal lifestyle. Tank later confronts Bullet with a hardened fighter as his secret weapon. He and Bullet engage in a fist fight, which later ends when Tank's fighter accidentally breaks his hand. Eventually, Tank returns to murder Bullet at a nightclub, where he corners him against a fence and kills him with a blast from a shotgun. Following Bullet's funeral, Tank is shown returning to his home later on. Louis (who had witnessed Bullet's murder firsthand), bound in black clothing, stealthily rappels down from a rope and lands behind Tank. He then proceeds to slit Tank's throat with a large knife, and releases Bullet's rat from prison atop Tank's body. The movie then ends with Louis saying, "payback's, motherfucker."
Different Versions
In the USA two versions of the movie have been released, the r-rated and unrated version. To obtain an R-Rating the movie had to be cut slightly. The unrated versions includes a bit more violence and nudity/sexscenes[1].
