My opinions on The Killer are a bit mixed. On one hand, as a fan of the Hitman games I absolutely love this look at slow, methodical assassination. I love that we get into our lead's mind. However...the narration is kind of ...I don't know how to describe the word. It's philosophical drive doesn't go anywhere. Yes, I know its his thought process, but it just doesn't really work for me. I do enjoy its simplicity though and it has a great, tense feeling a thriller like this needs. There is a sense of emotional detachment from the lead, but i think it works in the film's favor. Due to his life and the type of person he is. I honestly don't necessarily think we even needed the revenge story. I would've loved just 2 hours of hunting down and stalking out different assassination targets. That would've been more entertaining, and the revenge plot honestly didn't do too much for me. I can love a good revenge film, but this wasn't it. Something about the writing too that didn't super click.. It has some good humour when it does humour, though. I also find that, when looking at the golden rule of "show, don't tell", the film proves it can do the former quite well, but kinda insists on doing the latter.
While deep diving into the main character's psyche is very much appreciated, it did ultimately leave a lot to be desired but I wonder if this was an intentional choice of Fincher's because it's a big "show don't tell" feature, which is presented here in spades. Between Fassbender's (admittedly at time annoying) persistence to feel no empathy and Fincher's cinematography of constant reflection, the film at it's core really wants to keep you in the dark on so much but I think that this compliments it more than anything. We, as the audience, can only know as much about the lead as the contractors who hire him do. Which isn't much. We've never met someone like this before in our lives, and Fassbender/Fincher intend to keep it this way. A very big emphasis on being on "need to know basis" and we the audience do not need to know.
Technical-wise, Fincher always has it down...but something was missing in his direction this time around? A bit tricky to describe, but I felt like it was sort of bland direction-wise. Fassbender's good though, but again, the narration does nothing good for me. This film has a great score and sound design though. Tilda Swinton also definitely adds more life to the party when she appears, but that isn't a huge boost to this overall score from me. The narration is the main issue for that. Where I personally think it loses the touch when it gets to the revenge story, because then that combined with the mental drivel begins to feel a bit weightless for me. Like, it still is a well-crafted film and all, but it loses the spark of the first Paris part. I will say this though, the film is nowhere near bad, and its not mediocre either. Definitely deserves some praise, but it really just falters in execution and some smaller things.
