Directed by: Sam Peckinpah
Starring: James Caan, Robert Duvall, Burt Young, Gig Young, Bo Hopkins
If The Killer Elite has someplace to go, it is in no hurry to get there. I have rarely seen an action thriller that is this laid back. The film needs to be nudged along to set up the buildup, and then there is no payoff for all of our patience. We have good actors standing around waiting for something that never arrives.
The plot begins simply enough. A CIA man named Mike (Caan) is double crossed by his longtime friend and partner George (Duvall) while on a job. George doesn't kill Mike, but he shoots him in the knee and elbow, shattering both and leaving Mike to recuperate and rehab for a good 45 minutes of screen time. If you ever want to see a movie grind to a halt, throw in about 45 minutes of a character trying to walk again. He hooks up with a homely nurse who can't even be bothered to get rid of the lit cigarette in her hand when Mike falls, which is frequently as expected. Once he is recovered, Mike is offered another assignment, one which George has also taken (on the opposite side of course).
It seems a Japanese man of importance (Mako) is targeted for assassination when he steps on American soil. Mike's job is to keep him away from the hitmen and smuggle him out of the country. However, it appears Mike and George are being paid by the same CIA bigwigs which makes little sense to me no matter how much the movie tries to explain it. Why George betrayed Mike in the first place is also not made clear. Something about money and "it's just business", but I'll be damned if I understand it.
Thrillers depend on ratcheted up tension to keep things going. We must believe something important is at stake in order to keep our attention. The Killer Elite provides us with little to care about. There are double crosses and plot twists, but by then we have run out of goodwill. Even a scene in which a bomb is discovered under a taxi is handled almost as high comedy. Hitchcock once said (and I'm paraphrasing), "Suspense is waiting for the bomb to go off and shock is when it happens," Usually, a character trying to diffuse a bomb at least has a choice between cutting either the red or blue wire, but here the bomb is given away to a naive cop to dispose of. There is no suspense or shock to this sequence. The whole tone is wrong.
The Killer Elite is directed by Sam Peckinpah, who made his career on thrillers and Westerns. His handling of The Killer Elite seems like he intentionally left out all of the things that make such movies work, such as a sensible plot and intrigue. Maybe this is a satire of CIA thrillers and I just missed the joke. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
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