Skip to main content

Review: The Killer - 2023

Story - After a fateful near-miss, an assassin battles his employers, and himself, on an international manhunt he insists isn't personal.

Cast - Michael Fassbender, Tilda Swinton, Charles Parnell

Crew - David Fincher (Director), Andrew Kevin Walker (Writer), Alexis Nolent (Writer), Luc Jacamon (Writer)

Runtime - 118 minutes

         
Living amongst the “normies”

The year is closing and David Fincher offers us a thrilling movie about a hitman taking revenge over an assault made on his girlfriend. It is no surprise Fincher is one of the most critically acclaimed living directors (The Social Network, S7ven, Gone Girl, etc.) and in 2020 he released his first streaming movie, Mank in collaboration with Netflix. The Killer continues this partnership between the Streaming giant and the director.

The Killer, based on the 1998 French graphic novel of the same name, shows us a man who is capable of doing things as meticulously as possible, leaving almost no trace and depicting some creative ways to remove evidence. It is very much made for the "Literally me" crowd or at least those are the ones who will like it the most. 

One of the great things I think is unique to this movie (sorry if there is actually another like this out there) is the use of modern technology and the precise way to ambush people this nameless killer uses against his victims. Buying from Amazon, suing FedEx, copying an NFC card, these are very detailed ways to infiltrate places and I loved every single second of it.

I enjoyed it very much, and while I haven't read the novel I did find some shots to be similar to what a comic would illustrate. Fast-paced, engaging and it really looks like a movie, despite Netflix's awful video compression. I would love to see a Criterion 4K one day.

This movie may feel like a regular hitman movie -God knows how many Liam Neeson assassin movies we have gotten this past 10 years- but it offers us a very compelling revenge story, with masterfully edited sequences that make the action and tension build-up, a main protagonist -played by Michael Fassbender- that with little dialogue and precise movement can convey a real sense of danger. 

         

Final Score - 4.5/5

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Zootopia 2 - Review

              "The world will never be a better place if no one is brave enough to do the right thing."           ​I've been struggling to write a review for Zootopia 2 , not because I want to justify my liking of the movie and feeling this is one of the best films of 2025. But because I caught on to some themes and topics the movie tries to convey, however these are, at best, slim. At worst, my own imagination. Nevertheless, I can take away two things from it that, besides the emotional core of the movie and its themes of relationship and partner communication, managed to capture my attention and made me write and rewrite this 8 times: politics and business. Movie sequels are often the result of greed, and their results often end up being soulless slop. Zootopia as a film franchise has been dormant for 9 years, and during this decade a lot of events have affected not only the development of the sequel but also the way it can ...

Review: Resan (The Journey) - 1987

  Story  -   Petter Watkins' global look at the impact of military use of nuclear technology and people's perception of it, as well as a meditation on the inherent bias of the media, and documentaries themselves. Cast  -  Peter Watkins Crew  -  Peter Watkins (Director) Runtime   - 873  minutes           "I think to remove the veil of ignorance from the world is the most direct way at least to achieve enlightenment." Sometimes it is incredibly difficult to sit and watch a long movie, after all, the way of life in the XXI century has been accelerating to the point that 90-minute movies are consumed in 20 different parts on a tiny screen while commuting to work. This is a world that 15 years ago I would have never imagined. I believe on this occasion, watching a movie divided into 19 different sections has helped me to appreciate and embrace what it is trying to say on a different level. It is hard for someone in 2024 to...

Review: Little Women - 2019

Story  -  Jo March reflects back and forth on her life, telling the beloved story of the March sisters - four young women, each determined to live life on her own terms. Cast  -  Saoirse Ronan, Florence Pugh, Rmma Watson, Eliza Scanlen, Laura Dern Crew  -  Greta Gerwig (Director/Writer) Runtime  - 135 minutes