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KILLERMAN
Director: Malik Bader Cast: Liam Hemsworth, Emory Cohen, Zlatko Buric, Nickola Shreli, Diane Guerrero, Suraj Sharma, Mike Moh, John Cenatiempo, Souleymane Sy Savane, Stivi Paskoski MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 1:52 Release Date: 8/30/19 (limited) |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | August 29, 2019 Killerman is about a lot of cash and a lot of drugs. There are some people in this story, too, such as the head of a criminal organization with a foreign accent, the leader's eager but incompetent nephew, and a group of crooked cops. That should give one an idea about the level of consideration writer/director Malik Bader has for his characters. Adding to that lack of subtlety and depth is the movie's protagonist Moe (Liam Hemsworth), a jeweler and money launderer for the crime boss. The most we know of him is that he's a jeweler, an occasional money launderer, and the best friend of the boss' screw-up nephew Skunk (Emory Cohen). Then, while escaping from the dirty cops after a setup involving a drug deal, Moe crashes the getaway car. He ends up with—no joke—amnesia. Most of the plot involves Moe and Skunk juggling the money and the cocaine from that deal-gone-wrong from place to place. Meanwhile the villainous cops, led by the sadistic Leon (Nickola Shreli) try to track them down to retrieve the stuff they stole from the evidence room, and Skunk tries to re-jog his buddy's memory. It's all pretty simple (albeit wildly convoluted). That's no excuse for how simplistic it all is. The cops kill a bunch of people connected to the main characters. Skunk's uncle Perico (Zlatko Buric) doesn't appreciate that his guys went behind his back but wants to protect his nephew. After learning that he's a criminal (and having sex with a random woman at a nightclub, because he believes her when she knows him), Moe discovers that he's in a committed relationship with Lola (Diane Guerrero), who's pregnant. She's also shot and presumably killed, never to be seen again, about five minutes after the character is introduced, just to give Moe a motivation to turn the tables on the cops hunting him. As
clichéd as the amnesia gimmick is, there could be something to it. Bader,
though, ignores all of that potential for humor and suspense, giving us a
routine sequence of plot developments enacted by a bunch of bland characters. Killerman is formulaic, before it becomes dopey, and turns muddled, before it becomes cruel. With its big twist, which seems more like a punch line to the silliness title, the movie ends by returning to being especially dopey again. Copyright © 2019 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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(for
violence, pervasive language, drug material and some sexuality)
