On the surface, a movie like The Killer feels like something that has been done over and over again. In fact last year there was a movie on Netflix called The Killer that starred Michael Fassbender. But even before Fassbender’s Netflix movie there was the 1989 movie The Killer by director and writer John Woo. In that movie a disillusioned assassin accepts one last hit in hopes of using this earnings to restore the vision of a singer he accidentally blinded according to IMDb. And now in 2024, we’re getting another movie with the same title and synopsis.
What makes this 2024 version with Nathalie Emmanuel and Omar Sy different is that it has a new group of writers. Josh Campbell, Brian Helgeland, and Matt Stuecken penned this Peacock original movie. But John Woo? He’s the director. And you can absolutely tell from the official trailer that his fingerprints are all over this. You see it in the out-of-pocket gun fights, hand to hand fight scenes, explosions, and stunts. Unlike some comments that I’ve been seeing on YouTube that are ready to brush this off as just being a gender bent movie, I think including Emmanuel in the role of the spy and Sy in the role of the detective, makes it relevant for audiences today.
Emmanuel made her “breakout” and notable performance in Game of Thrones as Missandei. But she’s more than that. She was in Hollyoaks for 192 episodes, appeared in the Maze Runner movies, and became part of the Fast and Furious family. She’s also in Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis alongside Adam Driver and she has an audio series, the next Fast X movie, and an animated series in the works. Let’s not forget 2022’s The Invitation, a supernatural romance with a twist that is one of the best vampire movies I’ve seen in years. Point being, she’s more than that actress from Game of Thrones. She’s a star and it’s about time we acknowledge that she’s a baddie.
Then there’s Sy. The French actor did have a spot in Jurassic World and X-Men: Days of Future Past. But it’s in Netflix’s Lupin that he absolutely shines as a thief, Arsène Lupin. That show ran for three seasons and truly opened up a new side of French cinema for me that I wasn’t aware of and the lack of representation in France when it comes to people of color in the first place when it comes to the media they consume or create. Sy also has multiple movies in the works, ranging from action mystery to drama that puts him in the leading role. Point being, just like Emmanuel, Sy is talented and shouldn’t be brushed off by the internet who think this is just a lackluster remake of the OG film.
2024’s The Killer is a film with talented individuals who are honoring John Woo’s influential style. So it’s not so much as this is a straight to DVD movie that feels like it has got a taste of the Fast & Furious movies and ran with it when it comes to how over the top a movie can be. Where do you think movies like Fast & Furious got their audacity from when it comes to action? Where do you think movies like The Mission Impossible franchise got their boundary pushing action sequences from? They didn’t come out of nowhere. They came from creatives like John Woo. So if you’re not here for Nathalie Emanuel not following through with her final assignment to kill a young woman and instead helping her, then move aside.
People will watch it. I will watch The Killer.
Watch the trailer for The Killer below:
The Killer lands on Peacock on August 23, 2024.
