Revenge (1990)

One of my all time favorite directors is Ridley Scott, a incredibly talented craftsman who makes the most of the material he is working with. His brother, Tony Scott, on the other hand... he has a similar style but not as developed and a tendency to choose rather poor scripts. True romance anyone? Just kidding.
But when Tony Scott gets good material, he makes good movies. Like Revenge. Kevin Costner stars as a former fighter pilot who visits an old friend in Mexico. When he meets the friends wife an instant attraction is lit and it doesn't take long before they're humping themselves silly. Problem is, her husband is a mafia leader and he doesnt approve of wifepoking. This means that they beat the living daylights out of Kevin and dump him in the country, while the wife is disfigured, made a heroinaddict and placed in a brothel. Now, of course, Kevin wants... what was the name of the movie again?

Revenge is a very oldfashioned movie, in spite of all the sex and violence. We've seen it all before but Tony Scott injects his usual snazzy visuals and the movie looks really good. Kevin Costner does a fine job as the hero and Madeleine Stowe looks good naked and on drugs. Miguel Ferrer and John Leguizamo pops up as toughguys, which they are perfect for.

I dont know what else to say. Revenge is a good, violent thriller which has gotten a pretty bad reputation. Why, I dont know. The dvd I bought is the 20 minutes shorter Directors cut and since it was a pretty long time since I saw the original I really cant tell any differences, though it would be pretty amusing to compare them both. Some day. Wikipedia has the following to say:

The version included on the 2007 DVD and Blu-ray releases is Tony Scott's shorter director's cut, running 104 minutes. The original 124-minute version is due to Kevin Costner and Ray Stark.

The director's cut includes several re-edits, and in general deletes many scenes in the original cut:

During the scene where Jay is beaten, the main henchmen stomps on one of his hands, crushing several fingers; in the new cut, that scene is missing, replaced by that same thug kicking Jay a few times while he is on the floor.
The Jeep-ride sequence is shown in a more explicit way; also we see Miryea and Jay stopping at a nearby lake to drink some beer and have sex. The original soundtrack sequence has been changed.
The role of Sally K. is shortened.
In the opening flying sequence, while Jay's jet is in the sky, a beaten man can be seen crawling in the desert, as a premonition of future events.
After Tibby's revenge, we can see him selecting a new young wife, but as if it was something more protocol-related.
All the scenes that showed Jay's doubts and hesitations relating to the affair are gone in the new cut.

I dont know. I am not one of those people that absolutely has to have the _longest_ version. I'll have to dig up a dvd of the older version.

Anyway, recommended.