Produced by the legendary Tsui Hark and directed by action master John
Woo, The Killer (1989) was the first Woo film to achieve international
recognition while single handily creating a worldwide craze for the newly
emerging Hong Kong cinema (a second age of Hong Kong cinema after the Shaw Brothers). The Killer's style, part Peckinpah - part Scorsese
- with Woo's added sense of cool, has been ripped off by a seemingly nonstop
barrage of phony Hollywood imitations. Melodramatic as hell, grisly violent
and gloriously fluid - The Killer is a ballet of bullets. I challenge
you to find one edit error in the numerous, incredibly complex action
scenes
The Killer's effect on our culture can be seen across the spectrum -
it has been referenced in as many rap songs as Scarface - Woo's impeccably
dressed assassins and slow motion stride has influenced the works of
Tarantino and Rodrigez - it's famous "Mexican standoff" has been utilized
to seemingly no end in Hollywood along with the carnage of the shoot-outs
(in Woo's film not only do people get shot, the entire background gets
trashed as stray bullets fly) and the mixture of freeze frames, slo-mo
and regular speed film (a device originally utilized to great effect
by Woo's film hero Peckinpah, but brought back to even greater use by
Woo) can be seen in every action film made since.
The Killer's plot is simple enough - the somewhat cliché, assassin
sacrificing himself to do one good deed before his death, story - but
Woo's somewhat strange use of weepy melodrama, goofy humor, smashing
violence and male bonding creates a film like no other. Shit - you may
even find yourself somewhat teary eyed at the films conclusion!
In the Killer we have Chow Yun Fat as the assassin Jeff, a slick killer
who during a hit fires off his gun inches away from a lounge singers eyes.
In a quite horrifying scene the girl, Jennie (Sally Yeh), eyes bleed profusely
as Jeff tries to comfort her. The heartbroken Jeff decides to do one last
job in order to send Jennie to an optician able to restore her sight.
Jeff blasts a hole through a drug lords head during the Dragon Boat Festival
(Jeff dons really corny sunglasses, and a fake mustache - yes!), only
to have the police pursue him and the gang that hired him try to knock
him off.
Jeff having been betrayed by his best friend and having a gangster not
pay him the money needed for Jennie's operation adds up to one extremely
pissed off Chow Yun Fat. Soon Jeff is blasting gangsters left and right
- in one jaw dropping scene Jeff teams up with Inspector Li to blow
away white jumpsuit clad hitmen. As bullets fly the viewer is entranced
by the beauty of Woo's carnage until Jeff runs out of bullets - he brutally
throws a guy face down on a table, grabs a butcher knife from the block,
and brutally buries it in the thugs back - much to the amazement of
a shocked Inspector Li and the audience. This brilliant moment conveys
the brutality of Jeff's profession, momentarily removing the viewer
from the adrenaline high felt during the high octane shoot-outs.
The Killer concludes with an inevitable stand off - Jeff and Inspector
Li versus the bastardly Johnny Weng and his minions - in a dove filled
Catholic Church. As far as shoot outs go it just doesn't get any better
than this - Shotguns, machine-guns and pistols blast away as Jeff and
Li tear through bodies, doors, floors, windows, etc. while a quivering,
blinded Jennie huddles in a corner. Weng and his boys just keep coming
and the carnage is spectacular. Weng even kills a friendly altar boy!
All the madness culminates in a rather touching and satisfying finale.
The Killer is simply required viewing (beware of edited versions that
trim much of the violence, I saw what turned out to be an edited version
in a theater that deleted the head crushed by cane segment as well as
trimming the shootings. You can't go wrong with Criterion Collection).
