It’s been a while since legendarily meticulous director, David Fincher and alarmingly pessimistic screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker last collaborated fully on a feature film (Walker has provided uncredited rewrites on both The Game and Fight Club), but with the typically joyless hitman thriller, The Killer, they’ve finally hooked up again for the first time since majestically nihilistic Se7en.
It’s a long awaited re-teaming that’s so loaded with potential, I wasn’t even mad that they nicked the title of the similarly named, John Woo action-fest, but with Michael Fassbender taking aim as the titular assassin, expectations had to be at an all time high.
However, as the movie lines up its scope, locks in on its target, slows its breathing to lower its heart rate and gently increases pressure on the trigger, can it possibly hope to score a headshot that has it whispered in similar circles to other Fincher classics?
While he goes through his painstakingly obsessive routine in preparation of firing a bullet at the latest target he’s been paid to rub out, we’re introduced to our nameless assassin via watching his repetitive daily actions and an understandably world weary voice over. Utterly dedicated to his trade to the point that he barely registers as a functioning human being, this professional life-ender (let’s call him the Killer) is all set to “un-alive” his next job when a freak happenstance causes the entire job to go tits-up in the space of a single, unfortunate second.
Forced to employ his extraction routine even though his victim is still breathing, the Killer negotiates police and winding Parisian streets in order to get himself in the clear but upon arriving back to one of his safe houses in the Dominican Republic, he finds that his girlfriend has brutally beaten as a result of his failure. It seems that in an effort to cut ties, his handler, an attorney named Hodges, has ordered a slash and burn operation in order to appease the original client.
Despite the fact that the Killer’s emotional makeup seems to be comprised entirely of cynicism and Morrissey lyrics with not a shred of empathy to be seen, he nevertheless doesn’t take kindly to being a lose end and decides to start clipping things off from his side instead. Aiming to track his way back through Hodges and beyond in order to tear out his contract at the root, the Killer goes against the majority of his rigid code in order to inflict some disturbingly impersonal hurt on those that would do him harm.
However, as each hit slowly gnaws away at his code of conduct, what exactly is the Killer’s endgame? Retirement? He’ll have to be free and clear before he can even begin to struggle with that conundrum.
Those racing to watch The Killer hoping to get an orgy of John Wick violence needs to check their expectations at the Netflix menu screen, because while this is a globe hopping thriller with a coldly efficient assasin at its helm, it’s one directed by the man who gave us Zodiac, possibly the most slow burning slow burner that’s ever burned slowly. As a result, Fincher is far more interested in the execution of the set ups rather han the actual executions themselves, typically picking obsessively over the minutiae of plotting a quick getaway and the finer points of drugging a 60-pound pitbull. As a character study of a man whose entire personality is literally his job, it’s fascinating as his habits and professional quirks (an endless string of The Smiths constantly playing in his ear in order to keep his attention focused) is employed in order to add depth to a man who, by his own admission, simply doesn’t give a fuck. In fact his lack of identity – both personally and professionally – is driven home by repeated scenes of car hire and airport staff greeting him by his constantly shifting aliases.
As a result, Fincher and Walker’s cynical as hell world (although Fincher’s icy lead would describe it as skepticism) leads to some legitimately bone chilling moments as Michael Fassbender’s below freezing performance has him enacting some incredibly callous moments. At one moment he strives to gain information from someone by using a nail gun to thud a trifecta of nails into his chest and then patiently waits for his lungs to fill with blood; elsewhere a woman begs that he make her death not look a certain way in order for her kids to claim her life insurance and it’s these moments that stick in the brain like brain the most like a hollow point boring through a skull.
Fincher, taking a note from his lead character (or is the character taking his lead from him?) endeavors to to waste a single frame of film to get his point across (Hell, even the opening titles are brutally economical at barely 50 seconds long), but some casual viewers might be confused that the director simply isn’t afraid at deliberately triggering uncomfortable emotions such as frustration and boredom where other, less intellectual helmers, would simply fret about making everything cool for cool’s sake. Thus we have Fassbender engaging in super-tense waiting games and prep-time while wearing the most inconspicuous garb imaginable (“No one wants to talk with a German tourist.”) while the movie doesn’t even try to reconcile with the fact that he’s a cold-blooded murderer.
However, if there’s a flaw in The Killer’s meticulous armour, it’s that when you strip away Fincher’s details-orientated style, the actual plot is something you’ve seen a million times as the gifted assassin turning against his crooked handlers trope has turned up in a billion, half-baked, action/thrillers before. Yes, both director, writer and star ruthlessly strive to strip the piece of typical Hollywood cool and ask us to try and understand a man who, if paid, would fake your death in a fucking second, but at its core, you’ve basically seen the likes of Sylvester Stallone and Jason Statham do the same in a way that’s far shallow and crasser than this.
Undeniably slick and featuring fittingly glacial performances from the likes of Fassbender and Tilda Swinton, The Killer may not be in the league of movies such as Se7en, Fight Club and Zodiac, but it nevertheless falls in nicely with other fare like The Game and Panic Room – other takes at straight thrillers that benifited from that distinctive, Finchian, spin – and unerringly takes aim at targets that other movie makers might find too unsettling to bullseye.
The Killer: all thriller, slight filler.
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