February 12, 2025

THE KILLER (2024) – John Woo goes woke with a remake of his own classic

0

Rating: ⭐⭐

thekiller2024

Ace Hong Kong action director came back in style with Silent Night, his Christmas release last year. That movie was hard hitting and brought back memories of how great John Woo movies were, with some impressive action choreography, and John Woo’s trademark slow motion gun battles. He even upped the ante by making the entire movie without any dialouge spoken! Needless to say, I was super excited to see John Woo back with another thriller, and this time, doing a remake of his own classic The Killer made in 1989 which starred Chow Yun Fatt. Unfortunately, my heightened expectations were not to be met with this Netflix original.

One of the first things that will strike viewers is that the protagonist is a female this time. Natalie Emmanuel whom many may recognise from the Fast and Furious franchise movies, plays the highly skilled assassin, Zee. Natalie is seriously unsuitable for this and comes across as unconvincing. She looks simply too petite to be able to convincingly fight off bigger sized males. Her handling of the gun action also looks lame as she seem to be posing more than doing the actual fighting. Getting a female actress of colour to take on the all-important lead role feels like yet another attempt to promote the tired old work culture to the audience. Judging from her poor performance, I can only conclude that she is an example of a DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) hire! Shame on John Woo for feeling the need to succumb to the woke culture. The character of Zee rescues a young singer who has been blinded in the crossfire of one of her jobs. There are some hints of a romantic relationship between Zee and the blind singer which further adds to the woke agenda with a homoerotic angle. Fortunately, this aspect of the relationship was kept subtle and there was zero chemistry between the two characters. The rest of the characters also come across as very one dimensional and unmemorable.

On the plus side John Woo fans would be happy to see vintage trademarks like the doves, slow motion shootouts, the flying through the air acrobatics like moves and the church setting. On the negative side, these were repeated so often that they were beginning to feel repetitive. Is there such a thing as John Woo overload? The action sequences were also sadly not very creatively executed and did not matched those we saw in Silent Night. Perhaps the initial action sequence shot in the streets of Paris at the early part of the movie was an exception. Again, that proved to be a disadvantage as it set the expectations unrealistically high.

The Killer 2024 is a disappointment. It has some good nostalgic moments during the John Woo trademark action sequences. But the inability for the lead actress to convincing portray the assassin, and the obvious compromise made to support its woke agenda, makes this a misfire. I recommend last year’s Silent Night if you wish to see a more authentic and vintage John Woo.

0 0 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

0 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments