The Killer

 

As always, If I see a film in a theater, you will read about it here. I noticed several comments on-line that castigate this film as boring or even dreadful. I was very surprised at that evaluation because my experience was far from that. I enjoyed the heck out of the film, it has a slight throwback style that may not be satisfying to adrenaline junkies, but hits the spot with those of us who are interested in plot and character. Which may seem a bit strange because we know very little about the main character of this film, not even his real name, but in the long run, that is the point.

There are plenty of films about paid assassins out there. Most of them are focused on the job at hand or the intrigue behind the murder in the first place. This film essentially does not give a damn about those well worn paths, instead, it focuses on logistics and the kind of character that is needed to be a success in this business. Michael Fassbinder is playing a guy doing his level best to remain faceless and anonymous. We get to see the level of detail that he puts into his work. The meticulous set up and clean up of his job takes the first twenty minutes of the film, and when the job goes wrong, we see what discipline it takes to get away clean.  The movie reminded me early on of the Charles Bronson 70s classic "The Mechanic". In that film, we have a dialogue free opening ten minutes, and it is an excellent primer on how to tell a story visually. "The Killer" does not remain silent in the opening section, the main character is providing a voiceover to his actions. Most of the time he is explaining the principle behind his craft, not the details of it's execution, we see those being played out. 

There are action sequences but they usually come after a slow build up to the scene. For instance, there is a truly brutal fight scene that entails significant jeopardy to the main character, but first we see the stalking of the target. That process involves a lot of sitting in the car, waiting for other characters to act, and then a tentative approach to the subject. When the fireworks start, they are pretty elaborate with frequent changes in who is dominating the combat, and consequences for most of the physical actions. While lacking the perspective that we might have for John McClane, we can still feel the brutality and notice some of the aftereffects. That makes this movie feel a lot more authentic than some of the action cartoons that pass themselves off as drama in cinema's these days. 

I wonder if the reason that some of the people who are not reacting positively to the film comes from the fact that they watched this on Netflix rather than seeing it in a theater. As always, the theatrical experience forces you into a relationship with the film that is substantially different than the one you will have in your own home. The passage of time feels different and more immediate. The absence of ambient noise or side conversations press us into focusing on what is on the screen in a different way. The score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is propulsive without being in your face. The story transitions are smooth and fun to watch as the character makes his way from Europe, to the Dominican Republic, to the U.S. , and there is a running joke about the aliases he uses that some parts of the audience might miss but they got a chuckle out of me each time. 

Up front, the Killer himself talks about how dull his profession can be, because it involves so much waiting and watching. He goes to great lengths to avoid having to improvise. Sure it's fun when some character can Macguyver up a bomb with kitchen chemicals and a microwave, but that would be an anathema to our protagonist, who sticks to the plan, fights only the designated fights, and sees empathy as a weakness. The character has no story arc it is true, the fascination comes from watching how sticking to his foundational process works. It forces him to make choices that other screenwriters would have found a conventional way out of.  While we are spared having to watch him disassemble a body for disposal, we know he is doing it because that is what is called for. 

There are at least two times in the film when we could expect a screenwriter to try and inch the character away from his own manifesto, but the authors of the graphic novel that the film is based on, and the screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker, stay true to their character. The detachment the lead feels from his job, is aty odds with the relationship that powers the majority of the film. As a wounded subject, we might expect there to be emotional justification for his actions. The story never makes a point of his emotions in the murders he commits after the failed original mission. He simply puts his professional face on for a personal retribution that maybe lacks the satisfying punch that most revenge films seek, but nevertheless gets the job done. His confrontation with the Tilda Swinton character is a perfect example of how his professionalism can be seen as dull, but we also get to see it is the reason he is efficient. Director David Fincher allows stories to unfold in their own time. "Zodiac" and "Gone Girl" show us dramatic moments as they might play out, without the theatrics if an edited, rock score propelled sequence. If you are looking for a "Goodfellas" moment, there isn't one. There is just the cool, mannered and meticulous pathology of the Killer and his director.  

Gone Girl

Thrillers are a genre that need quality people in them to excel. Once in a while a film that has been tossed together will leave a mark, but true works of suspense need the kind of professional touch that comes from confidence in the field and the contributions of skilled actors and technicians. In the mid part of the last century we had Alfred Hitchcock. In the early part of the new millennium, David Fincher has stepped forward to supply the kind of bubbling, slow burning , suspense piece that audiences will crave. In the last twenty years he has made a half dozen films that rely on tension more than action, plot more than flash and performances that reflect reality more than theatricality. "Gone Girl" is another success in this line of suspense films with clever plot twists and a creeping sense of isolation as the story moves toward it's resolution. This movie is backed by several strong performances and a visual style that makes the audience feel haunted like it was a cloudy day, even when there is bright sunshine around.

The screenplay was written by the author of the novel that the movie is based on, Gillian Flynn. Adapting a novel to screen is always more complicated than people think. I'm not sure what her attitude was toward making a film out of her story but she has done an admirable job in forging an effective film. With the exception of the last five minutes , I could easily follow and appreciate the plot twists and story line. The tone of the ending seems right to me, especially given several foreshadowing scenes in the film. It was just the final motivation that fuels that exit tone that was not entirely clear to me. After having spent almost two and a half hours setting it up, the exit felt rushed and much less comprehensible than all of the main parts of this story filled with reversals. The director has the shots right and the mood is appropriately foreboding, but the script leaves it unclear why our main character makes the final decision that completes the film.

I have always enjoyed Ben Affleck as an actor. I know he is often criticized as a callow personality, overwhelmed by the material he is in, but he also has charm and a winning face and that has rescued him many times. His most serious role in his own "Argo" is a demonstration that he has chops and not just good looks. He uses both of those gifts in this film and helps make a convoluted and potentially unbelievable story much more grounded. Nick Dunne is a fairly likable guy who gets the Scott Peterson treatment from the media when his wife Amy vanishes. The film starts off without giving us any clues as to whether he really is involved or not in the disappearance. As events play out we discover that he is not as affable or admirable as he first seems. We learn that he has secrets, but also that his secrets probably have little to do with the event, but that will never be the way it is seen by the media. A large part of the tension in the film is driven by the tabloid like coverage of his wife's vanishing. A Nancy Grace doppelganger pursues the story and leads the social media lynch mob that is ready to convict Nick in the killing of his wife. As the film unfolds we do get some rival views of the marriage itself. It seems to have gone sour in the economic turndown and  Amy has her own demons that fuel those problems. Since I made the decision not to read the book before seeing the film, I think it is safe to say that knowing the story would undermine some of the pleasures of the film. There are five or six smart twists that all work without undermining the things that come in front of them. Those who read the book can admire the adaption, those who went in blind like me can thrill at the surprises.

The technical choices that help make the movie work as a suspense film will be recognizable as Fincher specialties. The camera movements are slow and steady and fluid. There is stillness in a great many sequences in the movie. The background score by previous collaborators Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor is moody and dissonant. The color and lighting are crisp but subdued to just this side of muted. When there is violence, the camera does not look away any more than it did in "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo".  There are two or three great scenes where a character tells us everything we need to know without it being shown, It would have been easy to let the camera fill in as a character narrates, but Fincher chooses to let the voice and face of the character tell the story and it works really well. A long interlude at a decrepit motel reminded me of the basement scene in "Zodiac". The characters we encounter are sometime more than they first appear to be. I won't give away anything but I think audiences who responded to those earlier films will not be disappointed here.

Special mention must be made of the performance by Rosamund Pike. She has been given one of the great female characters of the last few years to play. Her work as a chilly upper east-side elite, drawn into a warm romance with a misplaced mid-westerner is very believable.  Even more believable is her emerging brittleness and renewed frost as the marriage seems to fall out of the narrative that she has in her own head. Her character's mother took her weaknesses as a child and turned them into a fictional alter ego that became world famous. That makes what follows seem almost inevitable and Pike sells the sense of entitlement and superiority perfectly. There are a number of male leading roles that have been touted already for awards season, this is the first woman's role that breaks out of the pack and will demand a salute from her fellow actors at the end of the year, well done. Others in the cast are also excellent; Carrie Coon who plays Nick's loyal twin sister, Neil Patrick Harris is flinty and disturbed as a former beau ill used by Amy in high school, Kim Dickens portrays the detective pursuing the evidence rather than the man and she seems very authentic.

This is an audience pleasing suspense thriller assembled by the modern authority on that genre. If Hitchcock, DePalma, Lynch and the Cohen Brothers are on your regular watchlists, than you will be glad to spend two and a half hours puzzling out the plot, admiring the performances and feeling satisfied with the logic of the twists in this terrific film. If you have not read the book, stay away from any stories that might contain spoilers. The most satisfying parts of the experience are the the clever turns that all drive the story rather than merely shifting it's narrative.

A Walk Among the Tombstones

There are some things that you just can't unwatch, so you better be sure that you can handle what you choose to spend your time on in a movie theater. There are plenty of horror films, and graphic experimental sick point of view art pieces that I hope never to encounter. I know my limitations. "Irreversible", "Salo" and "The Human Centipede" give off enough warning signs to tell me to stay away. I knew this thriller was going to be tough, and it was. It does not rise to the level that I regret having seen it, but it will leave me with some nightmares about the brutality of human beings. "The Silence of the Lambs" defined the serial killer genre almost twenty-five years ago, and film makers have been chasing it's path ever since. Once in a while they get close, usually when a movie is directed by David Fincher. "A Walk Among the Tombstones" succeeds, much in the way "Zodiac" did, by creating suspense with a horror element and putting it into a procedural.

Director Scott Frank has made only one other film as the director, "The Lookout" which used an interesting premise to build a story around. He is not however a novice at films, having written and contributed to several excellent efforts in the past, things like "Minority Report", "Dead Again", and "Out of Sight". He has created a very tense thriller here based on Lawrence Block's well know series of novels concerning ex-cop Matthew Scudder. I've not read any of these novels but I certainly intend to now, this is a great character with real background and gravitas. The choice of Liam Neeson to portray Scudder is terrific because Neeson can play guys like this in his sleep (and has) but he knows that this character needs more depth. It seems strange to see Neeson killing people at the start of Fall instead of the dead of Winter, but this movie is different. It's not just another action flick where he picks off the bad guys, he has to solve the puzzle and manage his own failings along the way. This feels like a real movie and not just a popcorn filler for the afternoon.

The opening credits of the movie should be enough to give anyone with empathy some nightmares. This is another comparison to Fincher, who in Se7en, created a horrifying world through nightmare entries in a journal that is displayed in a gruesome, flashing manner. This set of titles is disturbing for a very different reason but it is equally horrifying. There are two shots in an otherwise artfully photographed set of images of a beautiful woman. When those two images are revealed, your breath will suck in and you will let out a moan of anguish. All of this happens without a spot of blood or gore. For the rest of the movie, there are additional sequences that will raise the hackles on the back of your neck. The sight of a van is going to make me look twice over my shoulder for weeks. This movie builds suspense, and does so with a limited amount of visual gore. It is exactly the kind of film I love. There are a number of moments that will remind you of gritty urban films from the seventies, and the paranoia that comes from a well developed monster.

Another homage, or ripoff, to Fincher is the use of a Donovan song. In "Zodiac" we hear Hurdy Gurdy Man as the first murders occur. While stalking a victim in this story, the killers have Atlantis playing on the stereo in their van. There must be something about the ethereal sound of Donovan's voice that perfectly matches the creepy vibe the directors are going for. For the first part of the movie we don't really see the killers but they are revealed to us in mundane ways that will also provoke a shudder. At the climax of the movie, the most frightening moment for me was not the face coming out of the shadows, it was a peek through a window, revealing a man simply sitting at a kitchen table, eating a bowl of cereal. If it doesn't freak you out, you must have the same kind of cold blood running through your veins.

I did not recognize a single actor in the movie beyond Liam Neeson. Sometimes that type of anonymity is good because we are not carrying the baggage of other roles and different movies as we watch. The Two actors playing brothers in the story are both excellent and their story arc is another bonus to the depth of the movie. The two guys playing the psychos are so banal in appearance that everybody looks like they could be a killer by comparison. There is a young actor, playing a kids role that feels perfectly natural in the circumstances in which he meets Scudder. The only problem I had with the movie was the frequency with which that character has to act in a manner that belies his well established intelligence. Still, a storytelling short cut or two is inevitable in a complicated movie. Except for the fact that this is a thriller, it should be competing for awards at the end of the year. Since these types of movies rarely get the critical accolades they deserve, it is better for you not to wait. If you are not faint of heart, "A Walk Among the Tombstones" is just what is called for by movie lovers.