The Jackal (1997) Review
Bruce Willis plays a cold, charming assassin who changes faces like coats, Richard Gere the IRA sniper sent to catch him, and the target is a real surprise. Critics hated it. It's an 8.5 and my favorite Jackal.
Tag: Assassins
The assassin is a professional with a code, which is why the character never goes out of fashion. This tag collects reviews of assassin films and the craft questions behind writing a killer an audience will follow.
2020sThe Day of the Jackal (2024) Review
Eddie Redmayne plays a charming assassin and Lashana Lynch the MI6 officer hunting him in this ten-episode reimagining of Forsyth's novel. A great first episode and good action, a saggy middle. It's a 7.
2000sThe Bourne Identity (2002) Review
The Bourne Identity (2002) rates 9 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Doug Liman fought the studio through a chaotic shoot, put a fight scene in a Paris apartment with a ballpoint pen, and reset what an action film…
1960sThe Manchurian Candidate (1962) Review
The Manchurian Candidate (1962) rates 10 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Frankenheimer made a political thriller that is also a comedy, a nightmare and a story about a mother, released it thirteen months before Dallas, and Angela Lansbury…
2010sThe American (2010) Review
The American (2010) rates 8 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Anton Corbijn made a slow European art film about a gunsmith in an Italian hill town, Focus marketed it as a George Clooney thriller, and it opened at…
2020sBullet Train (2022)
David Leitch's 2022 Brad Pitt action-comedy. Five assassins on the same Tokyo bullet train, each with overlapping missions.
1960sLe Samouraï (1967)
Melville's 1967 French crime film. Alain Delon as the hitman in trench coat and fedora.
1980sThe Killer (1989)
John Woo's 1989 Hong Kong heroic bloodshed film. Chow Yun-fat as a hitman trying to retire.
2010s13 Assassins (2010)
Takashi Miike's 2010 samurai siege film. Pairs with Seven Samurai as the modern remake the genre needed.
AssassinsJohn Wick 1-4 (2014-2023)
Keanu Reeves as the retired assassin. Action choreography that reshaped contemporary American action cinema.
AssassinsThe Greatest Assassin Films
From The Day of the Jackal to The Killer, twenty assassin films that take the moral question seriously. What does killing for money cost, who does it, and what does the work make of them? The genre at its best…