Friday, November 23, 2007

Hitman (2007)

HitmanBased on the hit Eidos video game, I have played some of the Hitman games including part of Hitman: Codename 47 (game 1) and I have completed Hitman 2: Silent Assassin & Hitman: Contracts (games 2 and 3). I love the games simply because you can’t just play them once, the game is designed so there are multiple ways to “kill” someone, you can go in guns blazing or you can sneak up on your target, even take a single shot from the roof top across town. Also in the game part of who Agent 47 is that he is a genetically engineered clone (like the Storm Troopers, Star Wars) while being an elite assassin (like Jason Bourne, Bourne Identity). The reason I bring up the Bourne Identity is because many of the reviews for this movie have compared it to the Bourne Identity. At the core they are assassin botches a job, meets girl, goes on the run with girl, and so on and so forth, but isn’t that every assassin movie?

Ever since I played Hitman: 2 Silent Assassin (the first Hitman game I played) that they should make a movie based on the game, in light of other movies based off video games I hoped that they wouldn’t F* this one up. Though I wasn’t to sure about the first choice for the role Vin Diesel he stepped down in December 2006, he did stay on and executive produce the film. Needless to say I had high hopes going in to this movie. I didn’t like about this movie was that everything was rushed, this is evident during the opening credits when “Ava Maria” is playing a credit would fade up nice and slow the quickly cut to the next scene, not to ruin the movie for any one but the opening credits is where they show you the origins of 47, they don’t do a real good job at showing that the kids are clones (if indeed they are), because during one of the fight scenes between agents you have 3 men from different races, what happened to them all being clones?

In the end Timothy Olyphant did a great gob acting as agent 47, I was really impressed. Also I like the coloring and lighting of the scenes it really brought out the red tie. Many of the camera angles were adequately positioned, in particular right before 47 enters the bathroom to kill a man the angle is of the third person view very reminiscent of the video games. I also enjoyed the plot twist at the end of this film, it was executed effectively. Killing, girls, and decent movies based off videos games I like, always a winner in my book.


Movie Miguel Rating: 8 out of 10
(Last reviewed on 11.23.07)


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