The Killer

It's well compiled. The narration got me invested. Shot beautifully, the suspenseful music is excellent. The movie as a whole is...yeah it's fine? It lacks depth and some scenes lack logic as well. It makes for a fun watch nevertheless. Better than most of the stuff going around these days. A one time watch and you never think about it again kind of a watch. Not Fincher's best but not his worst either. Fassbender is decent in his role portrayed as a mysterious killer who has a knack for everything pretty much. Solid punches to the face by a guy twice his size does not faze him at all. That's about it really.

The definition of a good thriller is that the plot should be slick and smart. That means the film is edited in such a way that it follows the narrative closely without a lot of extra fluff. It also means all the characters in the story act like real human beings and make logical decisions. One thing I have found about David Fincher is that he has OCD when it comes to details. The details are presented in an intelligent fashion. In this film, the details can be straight forward or logical when it comes to the plot. Fincher tells the story through cutaways, insert shots showing the little details that explain our main character's actions. For example, early on when the Killer (who remains unnamed) loads a magazine into his gun, it takes no less than three cutaways to accomplish this.

The opening act has a voyeuristic perspective, akin to "Rear Window" as we slowly get into the Killer's head through voiceover. The first act has an almost hypnotic quality as we study his situation, vigilantly maintaining a stakeout over several days, waiting for a mark. Filmmakers need to be careful when using voiceover, as it sometimes can be a conceit. Usually you try to tell the story through visuals. Here, the majority of the voiceover remains in the first act. Then through the rest of the film, bits we heard earlier are repeated at key moments during the film. My reaction is that these extra VO drops were unnecessary, but also act as a disruption. His train of thought in these moments is confronted with an unanticipated setback.

Finchers adds a couple touches of humour. I have stated in another review how important it is to find the right amount of humour to an otherwise serious drama. Too little and the drama starts to get stiff. Too much, and you are being removed from the reality of the situation. Fincher keeps the humour to a minimum, compared to one of his peers, Steven Soderbergh. Soderberg excels in this genre, with films like "Out of Sight" and "Haywire". The latter also includes Michael Fassbinder, the pro/antagonist in this film. All the supporting characters this film are almost cameos, but all are excellent.

The story remains focused on the Killer, never really revealing the greater plot, or what to anticipate as we follow the Killer through his agenda. But again, this is smart scriptwriting because it respects the audience's intelligence, who can easily fill in the blanks. Another staple of the Thriller genre is globe-hopping, James Bond style. The film is constantly on the move, as our main character travels from one airport to another. It is also adds the extra element of realism by shooting mostly on location (save for some interiors). The moments of action are well done. There are "Bourne" like moments with the action scenes, but not as frequent.

The film, because it is a singularly focused story about the Killer and a job gone wrong, has a generally small scope. The actions of the Killer are pretty straightforward, and there are no real twists. I appreciated that lack of multiple subplots, too many scripts try to overachieve and can become confusing by throwing too many side characters or too many twists. The slim story could be a drawback if expectations were higher. However, Fincher is very skilled at drawing you into the workings of clandestine activities with his meticulous cutaways (sometimes he'll shoot 70 takes to get a shot right). This precision matches the Killer's precision in resolving his issues.

There is only one gimmick that made me groan. Everytime the Killer presents an ID at an airport or rental car place, we see his alias is the name of a well known sitcom character. This is a cute moment of humour, but in reality would be a very stupid thing for our smart assassin. One doesn't even need to be of the 70s generation to recognise these well known character names (Sam Malone, Bob Hartly, Felix Unger, Archibald Bunker, etc,). Reruns of these TV shows run on digital side channels and on streaming services, so younger generations would also be able to recognise these names. If there is a security agency (like Interpol) looking for him, once they link a sitcom character's name to the Killer, they can easily search for other fictional sitcom characters to try and track him.

Ultimately, I sat through this procedural with rapt attention, with the tight editing and intriguing spycraft providing the momentum. With the opening titles resembling the quick montage of action shots and graphics like "Mission Impossible", it set expectations appropriately. One of the better thrillers made recently, it rises above other movies like "Equalizer 3" (which left me wanting). Not as big in scope and story as "Fight Club" or "Zodiac", but entertaining as "Se7en" and his outstanding TV series "Mindhunter". 7 out of 10.

This movie is perfectly fine. It is so perfectly fine, that I can´t think of a single explicit point of criticism at all. However, i can´t think of anything that made it particularly great either. It is too clean. Meanwhile that is the point of the movie. It is about a man whose entire life revolves around minimizing errors, being in control, and following a set of internalized rules without emotions ever coming in the way. And it is an interesting idea to see a hitman treating the profession of violently murdering people as just another repetitive 9 to 5 job, that you just have to get through day after day. But when it comes to telling a compelling story, that is a bit of a problem. Because what generally makes movies stand out - even thrillers like these - is the ability to get people emotionally invested, to have them feel with the characters. This is explicitly not, what is happening here. There is not a single emotion in this movie. It is kind of about revenge but not really. You are just watching a man go through his perfected way of getting his job done and this job just so happens to be killing people who show varying degrees of innocence. We don´t even know anyone´s name. There is however one amazing fight scene that has one of the best choreographies that I have seen in Hollywood in a long time and which had me at the edge of my seat for at least five minutes. Irnoically, this is also the only scene where the character decides to not follow his set of rules and ignores the fact that he might be a little bit too emotional to perfectly execute his task. And it is the most gripping scene of the movie. Maybe that means something...

7/10.

The Killer is very understated for a movie that is ostensibly a thriller, so I'm not really surprised that many viewers don't quite know what to make of it. But if you're willing to give it the attention and consideration it deserves I don't think you will regret it.

It's particularly interesting that so many people are faulting this movie for the protagonist frequently not living up to what he says about himself. That's kind of the point. The voiceover throughout the movie isn't narration, it's internal monologue. He's not telling these things to us, he's telling them to himself.

What makes the character interesting is hearing the things he says in his head, and then seeing how his actions either conform or conflict with them. When he tells himself "reject empathy" over and over, and then shows someone a sliver of kindness, we understand that he's violating his personal code of conduct and we're left to ponder why. Maybe deep down he's still a human being, no matter how much he might want to believe that he's simply a killing machine.

We all have an idea in our heads of the person we'd like to be, but we're seldom able to live up to that idea. In that way the Killer is just like us. Except he kills people for a living.

This film is not bad. That's not what I'm trying to saying, but if you showed this to a Fincher fan and tell him that he directed this, do you think that they would believe you? Doubt it.

This is one of Fincher's simplest films. Even the title, "The Killer". It's so unoriginal and uncreative from an honest standpoint. This is also derivative. Feels like "You", but make Joe less neurotic & impulsive, but more detached, alongside making the story less melodramatic and complicit, but more clinical and detached.

It's really not like Fincher's films. This film can be buried for Mindhunter season 3, a great Fincher show that explores the minds and psychology of convicted murderers.

This film feels like a modern Hitchcock film. I did a thing where I watched this movie late at night while just about half-asleep, and the movie actually felt peak. I started doing this with just about all other films not on my stories list, which I call them my "filler stories". If a film ever feels too boring and lacking plot, watch it late at night when you're unable to sleep but are so tired.