 One of my favorite directors, David Fincher, is back with a new film called The Killer. One of his worst movies to date. Let's talk about it. ["The Killer"] Now, before you get triggered, I wanna point something out. Even David Fincher's worst is still better than 90% of the directors puttin' stuff out today. And of course, worst is subjective. I think it's better than Alien 3, which I don't even fully consider a David Fincher film. That movie's just a disaster from front to back. It was already spiraling down the drain before he had his mitts on it. The Killer is a Netflix exclusive, which kills me a little bit inside every time I say that, because talent like Fincher should be put on the big screen. I know he's gonna deal with Netflix. I hate it. I wanna see this on a big screen. I know it was in select theaters, but not select by me. The movie's rated R. It's just shy of two hours. Features Michael Fassbender, who I haven't really seen in a while. It was nice to see him again. And it has a very slow, methodical pace to it. But if you're looking for a John Wick type movie, watch the four John Wick movies, because this ain't it. Michael Fassbender plays an assassin who's been doing this for quite some time. And he's very good at it. Not perfect, which is one of the things I do like. This is an assassin who has rules. He often doesn't follow his own rules, and he finds himself in trouble because of it. He makes mistakes. He has little slip-ups. And there's subtleties in this movie that I really appreciated. For example, there's a moment where he's spying on some characters as they're opening lockers with key cards. He's far away when he kinda grazes over in their direction to see how it's done. And when he goes up to the locker and tries to scan it, it doesn't work. Instead, he flips the card sideways and swipes, and then it works. That was fun. I like that little extra layer to it, where, okay, this isn't a Tom Cruise Mission Impossible Ethan Hunt character that's just really perfect at everything pretty much and has a whole team at his disposal. This is a one-man operation, a one-man army who has to go buy guns from a black market dealer. He has to scope out situations and environments. He has to kind of think on the fly as to how he's gonna solve a particular problem. And I like that this is a spy thriller set in modern times, but it's not over-reliant on convenient technology. Like, he doesn't bring up a phone and get like a fingerprint to open any door. He's not like hooking into a computer, hacking in something to open. No, he does practical things that you and I could do ourselves if we thought about it the way this guy does. The reason I say this is one of the worst Fincher movies is because his movies are so damn good. He did Seven, he did Fight Club, he did Panic Room, Social Network. These are all top movies for me. Well, maybe not Panic Room, but from a visual standpoint and a creativity standpoint, it's really up there, how he's moving that camera around through keyholes and around freaking door frames and it's awesome. Plus he has Zodiac if you want something that is slower and paced really in a way that kind of gets you at the edge of your seat waiting for something to happen, but it doesn't and that's kind of the point of it. Like it's just brilliantly paced out that way. The killer kind of fails in some areas that he normally doesn't. I do think it's paced a little odd. I did find myself not really caring much at all about this character who is for all intensive purposes a bad person who's out doing bad things and then gets mad when something bad happens to him and this isn't some aha brilliant storyline either. It is kind of a John Wick film. You have someone that's really good at their job who has something bad happen to them and so now they want revenge and that's it. That it's straightforward is all hell and if you don't have that over the top pageantry and spectacle but instead have a very slow kind of cased out film, it's just not quite as hard hitting. Doesn't make it bad though. I did enjoy my time with the killer. I didn't love my time with the killer. I don't even think I'd put a score on Rotten Tomatoes for it and I don't even know if I'd recommend it to most people and in fact, I'll go a step further and say my bias here is very telling because I know David Fincher made this film. If this movie hit Netflix and I didn't see David Fincher's name on it, I'd probably give it a chance and I'm not sure I would be that into the movie. I was willing to give it more because I respect the guy as a director and that being said, I will say the second half is a lot stronger for me than the first. I did dig the opening 10, 15 minutes of very little talking outside of a narration for Michael Fassbender and just watching him in his element, watching him do his thing. His character is very much a dexter-esque type, kind of an introvert. He has a very weird socially uncomfortable way of talking and he's kind of an NPC outside of one attachment he has to a real world person but essentially all he does is goes around performing his tasks and goes on to his next target. I don't even have to look at who the composer is. It's very obviously Trent Reznor doing this again. That's kind of David Fincher's go-to. Reznor goes a little much with the nine-inch nails in this one. I felt it was out of place a couple times. The music was a little bit overboard and it didn't really match the scene but he does good shit. I mean, Reznor is always really good on these movies. Visually, the cinematography is where Fincher really shines. Here is no exception but with a caveat. I really liked the framing of course. I like how he uses the camera but this is not really anything amazing from him. I've seen all this before and even done more competently in movies like Social Network and Zodiac and more playfully in films like Fight Club and Panic Room. This is just kind of bare bones Fincher not really going outside of his wheelhouse and that's a bit of a shame. Outside of maybe one or two shots where I thought, oh, that was different. That was unique. It's just kind of par for the course for him and again, that's not a knock. It's still very much beautifully shot. It does have that Netflix stank on it though and by that I mean, it feels digital. It doesn't feel film stocky enough for me. It has a sheen to it, a shine that I'm just not that big into. I like the millimeter look more than I like the digital look and this is falling on the ladder. So as far as recommending this movie, I just say tread lightly. Don't expect a whole lot of excitement. It is a slow film. There are a couple intense moments. There's one really cool action scene, a pretty great hand-to-hand fight that goes on for a few minutes. Very well done. That part actually was a little John Wick-ish. Outside of that though, this is not that kind of movie so don't expect a high octane action film. Don't expect a really deep thriller. There's nothing complex about this. It's just again, kind of like everything else, very by the numbers for Fincher. Very safe, very plain. And unfortunately that's a bit of a letdown. I wanna see this guy in his glory again, making something larger than life, something grand, something cool and slick. And the really misleading part in all of this is the intro to this really does feel like something Fincher would develop into. It has his music video style with this kind of slick killer title sequence coming up and the names of the characters. And then after that, it just goes to blank slate, kind of boring shit. I mean, it starts with explosions and cool ripple effects on the titling. And I just thought, what does this have to do with anything? Where is this movie at? I kinda wanna watch that one from Fincher. All right, let me know your thoughts though. Did you love the killer? Am I wrong? Is this one of his best movies? This is the one that he's been building towards. Or you like me and you just thought, okay, well, that was a movie. Let's move on with our life and never talk about this again. Let me know in the comments below. Please like the video if you enjoyed yourself here. And if you really enjoyed your time, there's a subscribe button. Why don't you hit that? I put out new movie reviews every single week. I'd love to have you stick around. Oh, and if you've been sticking around, there's a notification bell. You have to hit that. That way these show up in your feed and they don't get lost to the YouTube algorithm. It's the Wild West out there, people. 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