"Dying ain't much of a living," as Clint Eastwood once famously growled in The Outlaw Josey Wales, but you sure wouldn't know it from the movies, which routinely sport a gaggle of hitmen, assassins, and people generally collecting money for doing very bad things. As Jason Statham and Ben Foster pay their dues in this week's revamp of The Mechanic, here's a look at some films featuring a few of the more memorable contractors in cinema history.
The Lineup (1958) Hitmen have been longtime residents of classic film noir (perhaps most notably in 1946's gritty The Killers), but director Don Siegel's amazing cult film stands apart from the pack. What begins as a standard police procedural permanently jumps the rails midway with the introduction of two mob professionals (Eli Wallach and Robert Keith) in town with a few hours to kill. Wallach's raging ape in a too-tight suit is scary enough, but Keith's sweatless veteran manages to leave him in the shade. Once the film reveals exactly what Keith likes to write down in his ever-present little black book, the goosebumps run wild. Possible best touch in a movie full of them: Wallach's introduction, as he scowlingly leafs through a book on proper grammar.
Le Samourai (1967) Director Jean-Pierre Melville specialized in moody existentialism, a trait perhaps best displayed by the main character in this film, a gorgeous blank of a killer known simply as Jeff. Sporting an immaculate suit and fedora (and, in a neat touch, the white gloves traditionally worn by film editors), Alain Delon mournfully glides through the frames, as a man wholly defined by his profession.
What are his inner thoughts about what he does? Only his symbolically caged pet bird knows for sure. His example launched a legion of cinematic triggermen with a philosophical bent, including John Hurt in The Hit, Forest Whitaker's triphoppy Ghost Dog, and most recently, George Clooney in The American.
The Mechanic (1972) Jason Statham's a big guy, true, but he's got some major shoes to fill, as his source material features the immortal Charles Bronson at his absolute squinting flintiest. Beginning with the first dialog-free 15 minutes, which shows the (anti)hero methodically setting up an untracable hit, director Michael Winner's film glories in the mustachioed mystique of a man consciously setting himself outside the law. Subtle it ain't, but the combination of Bronsonian macho cool and wincingly mod settings (particularly Bronson's ridiculously sublime house, which suggests what would happen if Hugh Hefner landed a job curating The Louvre) make it an exquitely pulpy example of 70's B-movies. Plus, you know, that ending.
Charley Varrick (1973) Don Siegel again, this time with a crackerjack heist movie that leaps to another dimension with the introduction of Joe Don Baker, as a deceptively soft-spoken assassin hired to take down Walter Matthau's hapless safecracker. Sporting a houndstooth jacket and a snazzy pipe, Baker's utter walk-through-walls relentlessness serves as a primer for both The Terminator's T-800 and No Country for Old Men's Anton Chigurh. If only they had followed his grooming advice, as well.
The Killer (1989) An acknowledged descendent of Melville's earlier Samurai, Chow yun-Fat wears his heart gloriously on his sleeve here, as a botched hit causes a master gunman to unleash torrents of emotions. And bullets. Zillions and zillions of bullets. Many filmmakers since have attempted to emulate director John Woo and Chow's patented two-gun two-step, but the duo's aura of bloodspattered soulfulness remains uniquely their own.
Pulp Fiction (1994) An easy layup for any list on this topic, of course, but the combination of Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta still proves lethal, no matter the amount of duplications. Building on the matter-of-fact carnage in Reservoir Dogs, Quentin Tarantino's particular genius here was to show that even professional killers could get bored, cracking jokes and answering the calls of nature during even the most potentially dangerous moments. The combination of pop-culture riffs broken up by occasional gunfights proved far more influential than probably even QT could have dreamed: After this, independent films in the 90's featured more people hired to kill people than actual people.
Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) John Cusack's uniquely candid killer-for-hire would be inspired at any time, but coming after a glut of films about wisecracking men with guns, his neurotic second-guessing about his chosen profession seems almost heroic. Cusack and director George Armitage create a sympathetic, even endearing main character, without ever quite excusing him. As the scene involving a locker room and a pen show, potential romance and life-altering choices take a back seat to training. All this, plus Dan Aykroyd cackling to the rafters. For an example of a more mid-life assassin crisis, check out Pierce Brosnan in the sly The Matador.
Intolerable Cruelty (2003) The films of the Coen Brothers have featured more than their share of hired muscle over the years, including M. Emmet Walsh's cackling sleazebag in Blood Simple, the terrifyingly golum-like The Dane of Miller's Crossing, and, of course, Raising Arizona's Lone Biker of the Apocalypse. The mountain of a man named Wheezy Joe, however, might be their most unique, as well as the catalyst for what's possibly their most inspired sight gag ever. I'd say long live Wheezy Joe, but, well, you know. -- Andrew Wright
