The Killer
Therefore, it's easy to identify the subtext in Fincher's newest movie, "The Killer," which starts off with a 20-minute sequence of a professional assassin (Michael Fassbender) slowly and methodically planning out his hit on a man in a building across a Parisian street. He stakes out the surrounding scene for days, getting to know the movements of every person who frequents the area, carefully considering things from every angle, making sure he has accounted for every eventuality, leaving nothing to chance. When the moment to pull the trigger finally arrives, a chance sudden movement unexpectedly causes him to miss, ruining days of painstaking preparation. You can almost hear Fassbender (as Fincher) exasperatedly yelling "Cut!" for the 100th time, annoyed at an outside force keeping him from perfection.
On the surface, the plot of "The Killer" is incredibly simple: after the assassin misses his mark, his handler attempts to have him killed in an attempt to placate the client of the original hit. The assassin's wife is hospitalized after this botched attack, and he starts to hunt down everyone involved to get answers and revenge. That's it, that's the story. However, it's almost anti-John Wick in the tedium that Fincher chooses to focus on. The movie luxuriates in the mundane details of the assassin's process; he visits storage units to get supplies, he takes innumerable taxis to countless airports ("You have so many miles!" remarks an airline worker), he stays in a wide variety of hotels under a seemingly limitless number of aliases, all painting the assassin's life as a pretty repetitive and mind-numbing existence, primarily filled with administrative details as opposed to non-stop violence.
We get the assassin's inner monologue throughout, mostly telling us his philosophies towards his chosen profession but also cracking several jokes about his distaste for certain cities and types of people. It's a surprisingly funny move for a director (and subject matter) not exactly known for comedy, and it works terrifically to balance out the otherwise serious tone common to movies of this nature. Fincher also uses the inner monologues to perhaps question his own working methods; he, like the assassin, knows that an impossibly high standard of discipline and attention to detail is what separates the best, the chosen few, from the merely pretty good. The assassin asks throughout if it's worth doing what he does in order to be like him, the top one percent of the top one percent, and not like "you," likely meant to mean anyone not operating at an elite level. Even the other assassins he tracks down could be meant to represent different modes of doing the same work that don't result in being the very best. At one point, he remarks that he can't understand how another assassin (Tilda Swinton) can live in a nice house in the suburbs with all the "normies," implying that indulging in any kind of pleasure outside of the job is just something that gets in the way of perfection. You can see how we might be hearing Fincher's own voice in these sections, questioning his own obsessive-compulsiveness in comparison to other less tightly-wound directors.
From an action thriller standpoint, many will likely find "The Killer" a touch boring; there is only one real action set piece (a pretty good one at that) and the climax isn't exactly explosive, choosing instead to operate within the subtextual themes Fincher is exploring (is the final boss, the client who originally hired him, meant to be producers or movie studios, completely ignorant of the internal struggles of the artists to whom they mindlessly give or take away money?) It's an interesting note to end a movie on, and if you're expecting a certain kind of movie (say Fincher's "Seven", which actually has the same writer as "The Killer"), you're going to leave disappointed.
Fassbender, in his first movie for over four years, is a tremendous presence, grabbing your attention in every frame, even when he's just sitting on a park bench in a fabulous suit. He doesn't really get a chance to operate at a high volume, as his character is preternaturally calm, but his smoldering stare and intimidating physical attributes give him a constantly dangerous aura, never allowing you to get bored even when not much is happening. Cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt appropriately conveys Fassbender's menace, focusing on his eyes and catching moments of self-doubt and a facade of control that is starting to crack. Editor Kirk Baxter does a stellar job of sifting through the metric ton of footage to clearly convey the action (such as it is), using a metric ton of cuts to help us see what Fassenbender sees and make deductions along with him in real time.
It's a fascinating effort from a singular director late in his career, not so dissimilar to Wes Anderson's "Asteroid City", in which another popular and distinct director examines his own work ethic and style. It may end up being polarizing due to the expectations of Fincher's fans, but it's a delightfully twisted and fabulously entertaining piece of work from a legendary artist still operating at the height of his powers.
