The Killer

The main actress had a kick ass image. The camera simply loves her. But is she a killer?

It just doesn't work. The film cliches start thick and fast and soon go into overdrive. By the end the film is dripping in old camera angles, dull fight scenes and amateur plot lines. It is desperate to be an action film. But it is just a parody of one.

The acting talent is high. And the Director used to be known for blockbusters. But I can't help but feel they have all dropped in the rankings creating this 'straight to VHS' nothing burger.

The story is ridiculous. It literally makes no sense. A whole killing empire brought down for no good reason. All the silent pro killing replaced with amateur battles that are disproportionate to the problem. The solutions just making it worse for no good reason.

This film is bad. Comically bad. By the end you will be questioning whether it is the same John Woo. Or just budget retired one.

Not recommended 💩

Why John this is just not neccesary, this is simply an excuse to put two charismatic actors kicking assess, this is not a neccesary remake my guy, it's just like the original but without the essentially of that film, you should make a remake one of your American Van Damme movies, those are not good

The crow and now this one, stop remaking solid and classic movies please, you people should remade something like Waterworld or the Travolta alien movie, try to improve bad movies instead of remaking good ones, this is not a good remake and its feels forced and weird sometimes, you can do better ok guys.

I realise that John Woo is an iconic director, mainly because of his run of funky HK triad gunslinger movies, but whoever put this remake together skimped on the screenwriting, and the script. The direction is ok, but with the nagging feeling that the hourly rate there was also well shy of inspirational.

Every cliched character and trite line of dialogue feels disconnected, existing in isolation, awaiting their brief memetime on Tik Tok and Youtube.

Even the action felt kinda perfunctory, like a cheap sequel filmed in a hurry by an inferior production crew, with no sense of pride in their accomplishments. "Two more flash-cut car chases, an MMA ruck in a public space, a slow-mo bullet time shootout, and we're done, chaps".

What it resembles, more than anything, is a low-budget 80s Eurocrime actioner, with a mismatched Euro-cast, and a script straight out of Babelfish, tarted up in post to look vaguely modern. Unfortunately, it ends up looking like a badly animated storyboard.

I had to stop after 50min where I couldn't take it anymore, I mean it might be for someone but not for me.

John Woo has a style and I respect that! However I'm not sure if I would still have stomach for that in 2024, nearly 30 years after Faceoff.

You might ask how about the story then? Enough to know that a Killer with misplaced conscious caused a lot of civilians to die to avoid one particular civilian to die because she was against killing civilians. I know it's stupid. But that's the main theme, at least up until I said enough is enough. The plot has so many wholes and it looks so fake that even popular faces couldn't save it for me.

Do not waste your precious life with this movie, Mr Woo, please grow up.

So, after years of development, John Woo's remake of his 1989 masterpiece has finally graced our screens, unfortunately, despite my excitement for any new Woo project, this film felt more like Blackjack than his bold chance taking modern classic Silent Night. It feels cheap, sluggish and often tedious, while often devoid of Woo's trademark kinetic visuals and outrageous stunt work. Less romantic or operatic than vintage Woo, and more interested in the goofy-glam aesthetics of Paris demolition. It's like he's directing the late-2000s EuropaCorp version of his own material. Yet, there's still a fleeting glimpse at the Woo we know and love, the choreography, directing and editing are all there, unfortunately, it's just covered by an ugly gloss and narrative incoherence. The acting leaves a lot to be desired as well, Nathalie Emmanuel is no Chow Yun-fat and Omar Sy makes for a poor man's Danny Lee and the chemistry they share feels artificial at best. At least Sam Worthington was a fun watch for the brief screen time he had. Marco Beltrami's score doesn't really match the effort he made with Woo previously but it's at least a serviceable score. Serviceable sums the movie up perfectly to be honest. A mediocre remix that, for all its familiar elements, fails to improve upon a single aspect of its trailblazing original, condemned to die a quick death. The Killer is not without some entertainment value, it's still a big disappointment, but if it leads people to discover the original, it at least has some merit.