The Killers

source: The Killers

Hit men Max and Al come to Brentwood, New Jersey and kill Ole "the Swede" Andreson (Burt Lancaster). Life insurance investigator Jim Reardon (Edmond O'Brien) tracks down the beneficiary of the policy. He is helped by the Swede's friend police Lieutenant Sam Lubinsky (Sam Levene). The Swede was a washed up boxer who got mixed up with some bad people and Kitty Collins (Ava Gardner). Killing off Burt Lancaster right at the start takes away some of the tension. The movie stalls a little bit after a really compelling start. It would have been much better to have him live and he could hunt down for those responsible. Watching the flashbacks in this movie, the fact that he's already dead is always at the back of my mind. I love the start but the structure isn't as compelling.

Ernest Hemingway once described the only proper way to do business with Hollywood. You drive up to the California border and stop before you cross it. The producers show up on the other side. You throw them the contract. They throw you the money and you catch it and run away. Nice typical fifteen-minute noir opening informed by Hemingway's brand of ambiguity. There's a small town in New Jersey. Two malicious-looking mean-talking guys enter the diner and insinuate themselves into a position of command in a few minutes, making an occasional wisecrack. They announce that they've come to town to kill a Swede. After they leave, one of the customers runs to warn the Swede, but the Swede lies there in bed and says, thanks for coming, but there's nothing I can do. End of story. The rest of the movie owes nothing to Hemingway and has to stand on its own. And it's not bad. Edmond O'Brien enters the story as an insurance investigator determined to find out why the Swede (Lancaster) left his $2500 life insurance to a elderly chambermaid in Atlantic City, whom he'd met six years ago and known for only two days. One tip leads to an implausible other tip and before you know it -- well, within a week anyway -- O'Brien has the case solved and the bad guys all dead and the femme fatale (Ava Gardner) sent to the slams. If it's above average -- and it is -- it's because it is supertypical, almost an "ideal type" out of Max Weber. Lots of low-key lighting, mostly night shooting, Miklos Roza's ominous score (including a leitmotiv for the two killers that sounds exactly like the theme from "Dragnet"). Everybody double crosses everybody else. Of two childhood pals, one grows up to be a cop and the other a gangster. A beautiful and dangerous woman lies to a gullible but fundamentally decent guy but chooses to follow the money, casting her perils before swains. Sam Levene has a haircut that looks like the prototype for Don King's. A nightclub called the Green Kitty Cat or something, whose piano player launches into a nerve-rattling boogie tune when the two killers come down the stairs looking for O'Brien. Towards the end it gets a little confusing. Let's see. A quarter of a million dollars is stolen from the Prentiss Hat Factory in Hackensack. At the end, O'Brien seems to have recovered the money -- but I don't know how. There are some niggling flaws. Lancaster and his cell mate are in stir examining the stars through the bars. The cell mate (Vincent Barnett) has been studying stars for years. So how come he mispronounces "Orion"? And how come he says Orion is also known as The Big Bear? And how come he says Betelgeuse is the brightest star in the heavens? Now that I think about it, this is not a niggling flaw at all. It's deeply disturbing. And I'd feel even worse if I were Orion or Sirius. The writer did his homework in other ways though. Yes, Chestnut is a prominent street in Philadelphia. And Newark at the time was filled with insurance companies, a poor man's Hartford. And MArket was a real telephone exchange in Newark. The Ledger was the most prominent local paper, and still is, though it's now the Star-Ledger. I'll have to check on those hats in Hackensack. Final note: It's interesting how Hemingway, through his prose and dialog, almost created his own universe which, once immersed, the viewer comes to take for granted as natural. But Big Ernie's dialog doesn't translate too well to the screen, nor does his writing style. (Name a very good movie made from a Hemingway story.) What looks pungent on the page comes out arch on the screen. Of course there's not a heck of a lot of Hemingway in this movie anyway -- only the opening scene, up to the point at which the Swede dies with grace.

The first 15 minutes of this film are based on Ernest Hemingway's short story, in which 2 killers turn up at a remote town to murder a gas station attendant called The Swede. This section of the film is fabulous. It's direct and snappy (like Hemingways prose) and similar in tone to the introductory scenes in David Cronenberg's "A History of Violence". The rest of the film is loosely inspired by "Double Indemnity", released a couple years prior. Using flashbacks it provides the back story that leads to the Swede's death and introduces us to an insurance investigator, named Riordan, (Edmund O'Brien) who serves as our narrator. Like most old noirs, the pace lulls in the middle section. All the noir elements are here - the double crosses, the femme fatale, the gangsters, the smoke filled bars - but it all feels a bit too mechanical, director Robert Siodmak unable to rise above the material. Still, "The Killers" shut the book on the classic noir cycle's use of flashbacks. Each flashback segment is prompted by Riordan's finding of some clue, as someone begins to tell him about their part in the mess. It's illogical and unlikely that someone would piece together a case in such a way, but cinematically it works. 7.9/10 - Despite a strong opening and brilliant last half hour, this is a minor noir. The dialogue lacks wit and the middle hour lacks bite. Still, it's worth watching if you're a fan of classic noirs. One more thing. Keep an eye peeled for references to cats: 1. Kitty (Ava Gardner) 2. The Green Cat. (bar) 3. Meow scene 4. Glasses of milk 5. Cat statues It all makes little sense, until we see Ava Gardner sobbing at the end, her nine lives expired.

This is a beautifully made improvisation on a Hemingway story that screenwriters Tony Veiller, John Huston and Richard Brooks, along with director Robert Siodmak, have somehow turned into baroque film noir. The movie starts out with a couple of hired gunmen looking for a character named Swede in a small New Jersey town. They tie up some people they encounter in a diner where they expect the Swede to be, then go and look for him, as he has not turned up at his usual time. A young man they tied up breaks loose and goes and warns the Swede, who thanks him but does nothing, remaining in bed, smoking a cigarette, waiting for the killers to show, which in time they do. The rest of the movie is an exploration, conducted by an insurance investigator, into the murky issue of why the Swede allowed himself to be murdered, and who ordered the killing in the first place. I can't say the movie's exploration of the Swede's character runs deep, or even that it's satisfactory in its psychology. It works so well because it's excellently written, photographed (by Woody Bredell), and acted (by Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner, Edmond O'Brien and Albert Dekker, among many others), and consists of flashbacks, and in some cases flashbacks within flashbacks, as its labyrinthine plot, full of double crosses and unexpected turns, drives the film with a relentless urgency that in the end has less to do with psychology than the workings of fate. There is an overwhelming feeling in this film that people behave the way they do because they are driven by forces they cannot understand. In this sense the story in itself is, as presented, shallow and depressing, and yet the movie is so well-crafted, with the action at times seeming to be choreographed, that the end result is akin to an existential roller-coaster ride, if not much to think about.

'The Killers' was released on 1946. Back then, the film-noir genre was really popular. And in my opinion, this one is one of the best of this great cinematic genre, because it's told in a different way than most of its time. This movie is told through really smart flashbacks. 'The Killers' begins with two hit men arriving in a small town with only one objective: kill 'Swede' Anderson (Burt Lancaster). After this, a detective starts to investigate his death, by interviewing the people of the town. This is how he uncovers a murderous plot evolving multiple characters. This is one of those movies that really keeps you interesting and anxious on what's going to happen, ans when the plot reveals itself, it's really awesome how everything is around Kitty Collins (Ava Gardner). The story is well-told and aged really well. The acting here is not superb, but it's not bad also. The movie is important because it's the first major role of Burt Lancaster, and the movie made him a star. It also features the always beautiful and mysterious Ava Gardner and the competent Edward O'Brien, in a interesting role. I have never watched a Robert Siodmak picture before, and was surprised to see how well he directed this picture. The camera was always at an interesting and different angle, and there's one nice tracking shot in the middle of the movie. Along with the well-made soundtrack by Miklós Rózsa, and the also well-made cinematography by Elwood Bredell the mood in here couldn't be better. Overral, this is a great film-noir movie, one of the best of its genre. It aged really well, most because of Ernest Hemingway's powerful story. It keeps you interested, with nice acting and directing. 8/10

The Killers is mostly dull and sometimes stupid. Burt Lancaster's terrible throughout, overacting every moment and never once evoking. Ava Gardner's definitely underutilized, her expressions with her shirt tightly tucked in, beat anything that the dialogue has to offer. When she asks to powder her nose, he could just say no...

This film seems to get a lot of love, and to extent, it deserves the acclaim. The first 20 minutes of the film is an adaptation of a famous short story of Hemingway. The film starts with two killers taking over a diner, waiting for a local known as "Swede" (played by Burt Lancaster in a breakthrough role) that they've come to kill. When Swede doesn't show, they leave, and Hemingway's ubiquitous protagonist, Nick Adams, races to the Swede's apartment to warn him. For the first 20 minutes, the writing is excellent, the dialogue terse, and the viewer is left with a grim view of the coldness of life, which provides moments of sudden danger and incomprehensible actions. And then Hollywood makes its contribution. Around the gem of a short story, the film makers added a backstory explaining the Swede's actions (or lack thereof) including crime, a femme fatale (played by the gorgeous Ava Gardner), a robbery, and a conflict about stolen money. The larger film is far less interesting. Unfortunately, the film spends most of its time following the actions of an insurance investigator played by Edmond O'Brien, who just cannot command the screen as well as Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner can. Perhaps if Lancaster and Garnder had been given more prominent rules and O'Brien had been marginalized, the relative triteness of the larger screenplay could have been overlooked. I give this film a 6. The first 20 minutes are epic, but the rest isn't.

This opens atmospherically, then leads into a plot overcooked by several hours. Well filmed in black and white of course, it has a beautiful look for much of its running time. Edmond O'Brien who should be named as the lead as he has the most screen time and carries us along the plot is good, no better, Burt Lancaster in his first screen role is wooden or overacting, Ava Gardner is similarly poor and the rest of the cast just pass muster. Very overrated. If you want great noir try Murder My Sweet, This Gun For Hire or The Maltese Falcon, but this'll pass the time for you while looking good; no better than that.

I always thought the best part of this film was the opening scene in the diner with two of the toughest guys in the film noir genre: Charles McGraw and William Conrad. After that, it went downhill but is still quite passable as a film noir. It's also nice to see Ava Gardner in her prime. Take a look: there is a woman with some true sex appeal! Also fun to admire was the cinematography, which usually is good in film noirs. This was Burt Lancaster's first major role and he looks and sounds different from the Lancaster most of us know through his great films of the 50s on up. Most of the story is told in flashback as an insurance salesman (Edmund O'Brien), who is the real star of the film turns detective in trying to find out why "Swede Anderson" (Lancaster) had been murdered. The story is okay, not super but worth watching for the Ava and the photography.