An existential crisis plagues a professional hitman after a job gone wrong in Fincher’s serviceable genre exercise, shot in his trademark methodical style that mirrors his protagonist’s attention to process. 

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David Fincher’s trademark methodical filmmaking style reaches its apotheosis with his new Netflix original, The Killer, a follow-up to his more polarising Mank (2020). 

Some have described it as ‘pure Fincher’, though that could easily be a descriptor for any of his finest pictures.  In this case, the ‘purity’ is in its alignment between the philosophy of the auteur and his protagonist. 

Michael Fassbender’s hitman character is Fincher’s surrogate for disciplined professionalism.  As the nameless ‘killer’ mental-talks himself into delivering the most focused performance to achieve his next target, Fincher likewise showers him with the obligatory film language—exacting shots, intensified cuts—one he has perfected over many films. 

As such, this ‘mirroring’ of methodology and attention to process is what gives The Killer a certain self-awareness that other movies by Fincher can’t claim to possess. 

“My process is purely logistical, narrowly focused by design.”

Its quasi-meta nature, however, doesn’t quite push the work beyond the serviceable genre exercise that it is, though some might disagree that it is precisely the film’s ‘I don’t give a rat’s ass’ ideology that makes it more darkly comic than usual.  In some way, it is Fincher’s funniest film to date. 

The Killer may be stylistic but it isn’t sensational; it doesn’t put a romantic halo on the titular character that a traditional 007 movie might on Bond.  Instead, the killer is a resourceful everyman who uses Amazon Prime to get the tools he needs.  His kills are much more shocking in their bloody, unsentimental realism. 

Fassbender is fantastic in the role, giving it a cunning edge.  He must hide and hunt after a job has gone wrong.  He must fall back on the process that has served him so well, even as he faces the disorienting weight of a growing existential crisis within him. 

Fincher builds an entire story out of one man’s intra-diegetic narration.  His protagonist must stay focused, remember and repeat his lines, or the film will fall apart.   There is simply no room for error again.

Grade: B

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