Rating: C
Dir: Michael Matteo Rossi
Star: Vernon Wells, Chris Moss, Paul Logan, Marnette Patterson
After The Killer’s Game, this is the second film of November where a hitman is diagnosed with a terminal iillness. Well, loosely. In this case, the victim is less a hitman himself, than a wrangler of assassins. Referred to only as “The Old Man” (Wells), he’s a former cop who assembled a clan of killers, in a range of styles, totally devoted to him. But now he’s dying, and has one last mission for them. Kill Fowler (Moss), son of the corrupt colleague who destroyed the Old Man’s career, and as many of his associates as possible. Whoever amasses the highest body count will inherit the considerable sum the Old Man accumulated over the years.
There’s an interesting selection of characters here, from One Hit Hustle, who can kill with a single punch, to Psycho (Logan), who likes to chow down on his victims. These are all introduced with a voiceover by the Old Man, and did a good job of setting the scene for what’s shaping up as an all-you-can-consume violence banquet. Except, your delivery of that just got cancelled by Uber Eats. Instead, over the next hour, until things finally kick off at the function to celebrate Fowler’s promotion, you will get a lot of talk and a disappointing amount of action. Some of the chit-chat is still entertaining: Wells is his usual, reliable self and Moss becomes increasingly unhinged, ramping up to a speech at his party that sounds like he was channeling peak Adolf Hitler.
But there are a number of problems elsewhere, the main one being a lack of likeable characters. Unlike, say, John Wick, you’re given no reason to root for these hired killers. There’s no real moral agenda here: they go after Fowler, simply because they’re told to do so. He’s not even the person who acted against their boss, just a descendant thereof. True, he’s a dick. But yelling a lot hardly warrants the death penalty, never mind the slew of still more innocent bystanders, also slaughtered at the function. It feels like a suicide mission, and taking it on in the way they do isn’t the act of smart professionals. Shoot Moss, blow up the building on your way out. Mission accomplished.
When the violence kicks in, it’s not bad, though the digital blood is obvious and disappointing (the function also appears to be taking place in a decommissioned K-Mart!). We finally get to see the killers and their various styles of mayhem in action, and they’re fun to watch, with some hard-hitting moments. I couldn’t help wondering where the energy had been up until this sequence, and why the Old Man, the film’s emotional heart, largely vanished as things progressed. It’s a case where I feel the elements are here for success; they just aren’t quite combined in a way to reach such a positive result.
The film is out now on Tubi, and also available on other VOD providers.