A Vietnam veteran, Charles Rane, returns home after years in a POW camp and is treated as a hero. When thugs invade his home to steal the silver coins he received for his service, they mangle his hand and leave him and his family for dead. Rane survives and becomes obsessed with getting revenge. Aided by his loyal friend Johnny Vohden, Rane, now wielding a hook for a hand, sets out on his mission of vengeance.
[It] has some good things, but in the way it has been directed by John Flynn it moves so easily and sort of foolishly toward its violent climax that all the tension within Charlie has long since escaped the film.
– Vincent Canby,
New York Times,
9 May 2005
rotten:
In sum, it neither rolls nor thunders.
– Variety Staff,
Variety,
26 Mar 2009
fresh:
Performances are made crystalline through a sixth sense for camera placement and curt cutting from director John Flynn, whose 2007 passing was little noted, though his no-BS way of laying down a story is a rare commodity in any era.