(Coburn is good in his handful of scenes too, but unfortunately he's not really given much to do beyond look concerned and issue some ominous warnings about Fahey getting too close) Again its not a terrible movie, but its just too slowly paced for its own good. (Hmmm an assassin with his own moral code.where have i seen that before?) That said, its not terrible, if you stumble across it as I did, its worth a look if only for Fahey's very solid performance. Instead we get a lot of Fahey grimacing over him violating his own code. A movie like this, i'm not asking for it to be funny but a couple of wry tossed off one liners here or there would've been very effective. It's not a bad film, just a very flat one that has all the appeal of a mass produced industrial production when compared to something clever or inspired.ДЇahey is good here actually.the story's ok enough, its got all the classic ingredients of a solid film noir-its got a potential femme fatale, its got a decent enough boss character played by a great veteran actor (in this case James Coburn), its got a hero who is talked into murdering a guy who's giving a woman a lot of trouble.I just 100% described 'Double Indemnity' which this movie is nowhere near the quality of.but for once its not the screenplay's fault so much as it is the pacing of the is sloooow moving from plot point to plot point. We have every staple of the thriller/noir TVM В– soft porn, jazz music, unimaginative direction В– it's all here.

Overall this is so very predictable and clichГ©d that it really fails to inspire even a little bit of interest. The only surprise was Coburn who I imagine has let stuff like this slip off his CV since he got his Oscar.

On top of the clichГ© ridden film we have an obvious bit of casting with Fahey and Butler (neither strangers to this tvm stuff). Nothing in the plot or film really manages to be different from any other TVM you'd see and it fails to engage simply for this reason. After that how else can they make it really stand out В– well lets shoot it all in blues and shadow of TVM noir and have the usual jazz soundtrack to add `atmosphere' and `mood'. Imagine the planning meeting for this! `hey, lets make a thriller about a hitman who is ruthless, but really a good guy who is sensitive and listens to classical music', `yeah В– and lets have him be kind but tough В– and trying to get out of the business except this one last job'.

When the wonderfully creative people in the TVM business sit down to really push the envelope on a project they really go for it. However when Pike completes the contract he falls for Jordan, a situation that leads him into a double crossing situation where deception leads to murder. Pike takes a job from Mahew to help out a family friend, the beautiful Jordan. He kills on behalf of lawyer Peter Mahew who is part of a committee of lawyers who hand out their own version of justice. Charlie Pike is an ex-Government agent turned contract killer.

The hit list movie 1993