cmayerle-41064 When you watch a movie like this or Dangerous Liaisons, you just wonder why Stephen Frears doesn't do more movies like this. The Hit is a road trip film through the beautiful and sparsely inhabited Spanish countryside with some offbeat humor and too-deep philosophy, delivered mostly by Terrance Stamp. It's not fast paced and it has long periods where there's little dialog even. However, it's timing is impeccable and Stamp, Hurt and Roth all give great performances. Essentially, I think it shows off Frears' talent much more than most of his recent arthouse movies.The ratings for this movie are all over the place, which suggests that it's not for everyone. So, who is it for? Shallow philosophers who like just a very little bit of violence and gore, a plot that's not hard to follow, and great actors/actresses who have 2 hours to watch the movie through in one sitting.

jzappa It was a bizarre crossbreed, London crime drama and Spanish road picture, maybe condemned by its displacement and disdain for genre convention. Hardly any critics at the time grasped the film's intermingling of the hip and the high-minded. Today's critics, comparatively at least, would welcome it in the company of its offspring, like Gangster No. 1, Sexy Beast and In Bruges, and the American counterparts contributed by the Coens and Tarantino. A few films have mythologized British underworld since Michael Caine's glory days. The Hit challenged it in unique ways, reconnecting its rogues into a different legendary backdrop, that of the western, as Braddock and Myron transport Willie along the roads that twist through Spain's parched landscape.The ostensible hero of The Hit is Willie Parker, who, in the beginning, rats out four of his mob mates. Flash-forward a decade, and his unperturbed life in southern Spain terminates with the appearance of underworld executioner Braddock and his rookie associate Myron. They seize Willie and travel towards Paris, where he'll be handed over to the boss of the men he informed on. The film opens with a bristly Eric Clapton solo, signaling a foreshadowing slow-mo shot of a man in an off-white suit sauntering up a hilltop. Paco de Lucía's flamenco soundtrack turns on the dismay throughout. The man, Braddock, faces the awesome vista, but does he see it? This ill-omened image sponges from a later scene when Braddock must make a life-or-death choice. Its return tosses a circle around the tale, bringing the characters to the stage where they must face mortality.The personal dialogue exchanges that bear the rapport between Willie and his dispatchers are interspersed with Braddock and Myron's eruptions of flamboyant viciousness, which bequeath footprints for the police, headed by a dismayed detective played by the excellent Fernando Rey. Braddock's murders are the undertakings of a man demoralized by Willie's sublime calmness. For predator and prey are seemingly upturned in this very humanistic gangster film. Willie incessantly reframing Braddock and Myron's mindsets, as when he interprets Braddock's failure to kill Maggie, the doe-eyed Spanish beauty they've snatched from the Madrid apartment where she stayed with the fearful Australian goon Harry. "It's supposed to be quick, clean work," Willie prods Myron as Braddock crouches on a swathe of badlands. "It was a mistake," Myron rationalizes. "Yeah, but he's not meant to have accidents. Perhaps he's slipping." Willie further condescends them when explaining in epic historical terms to Myron why Spain has so many castles. But in gibing Braddock and Myron, who fade in contrast with Charlemagne's renowned brothers in arms, Willie encourages Myron to ask him why he turned stooge. By smoothly replying that he couldn't confront prison again or decline the prosecutors' deal, he remembers the two-faced Willie seen in court, and checks the pity we may have for him as a Zen desperado who's reconciled himself.If Gal in Sexy Beast is incapable of communicating his existential dilemma, Willie's a philosopher cut from a different cloth than the standard East End thug. Willie's sophistication is despised by others of his sort, and probably also by those who anticipate a more traditional crime film. In a safe house before his court appearance, one of his guards snatches his book. One of the Spanish punks who hijack Willie for Braddock wields a knife at his Escher print.Frears shuns car chases, gunfights, and sex for obscuring the customary functions of captive and captor, lyricizing a story that evolves in immorality, and concentrating on a protagonist who irrevocably disappoints us. In stage-managing the doctrines of the gangster film, the western, the road movie and even film noir, Frears probes their authenticity. And although this narrative amalgam is awash with confrontation, it inhabits the inner life instead of the outside. Willie's and Braddock's wits work overtime, and their unseen battle is more gripping than the periodic murders and the police hunt. This elevates The Hit into a transcendental domain where gunfire has no range.The story's generational divide aids a reconciliation toward the finale. Braddock loses control when he sees Myron catnapping on watch duty, but he finds Willie observing a waterfall. Willie stands facing away from Braddock, who trains his gun, but is too intimidated to squeeze the trigger. The haunted picture of Willie set against the wall of mist hints at the inescapable death of Christ. That night, they talk intimately in the woods, where Braddock doubts Willie's audacity. "We're here," Willie says, "then we're not here. We're somewhere else. It's as natural as breathing. Why should we be scared?" Earlier, Willie puzzles Myron with another speech justifying death as harmless. All this would look like obvious laboriousness, premeditated to put his captors off guard, were it not for Stamp's skillfully hazy performance. The last of Willie's words and movements that we see in the movie are staggering in what they tell about him. Regardless, it's not his honesty we distrust, but his deceit, as his arousal of sympathy in Braddock culminates in a sort of liberation for both.

johnnyboyz I can't believe that this film had gone for so long without me knowing it was around. I'm a big fan of the crime/drama genre so when I stumbled across the fact it was going to be on some free to air digital channel at about one in the morning a couple of months ago, I thought I'd give it ago. In fact, I'd never heard of it before nor have I since. No one seems to know of it and it's a damn shame as this is a VERY underrated film, especially surprising given the fact John Hurt, Terrance Stamp and Tim Roth are in it.The film deals with human interaction between a 'grass' from ten years back, a rookie gangster and an old-time gangster in almost superior form to many other films. The fact it takes a 'road movie' approach gives us more time to develop with the characters, as well as the characters themselves to do a bit of bonding. What follows is some fascinating dialogue between the three (and between a young Spanish girl on a lesser extent) and some very interesting relations building up. The stone cold presence from Hurt, the silent but 'you know he's up to something' Stamp and the, almost, 'comic relief' character in the form of Tim Roth all combine in a truly mesmerising mixture of events. I was glued to the screen.The narrative also takes on a mysterious, almost multi-layered approach when talking about the police hot on their tail. The fact we never hear the detectives talk or any of the police communicate leaves us with a sense that we know what's going on but we're not actually there, almost as if the three male characters in the car are dreaming up the scenes themselves as to what MIGHT be happening at their last point of call if the police had yet arrived.The action and dialogue is well spaced, even though the script is great anyway, and you truly struggle to work out what might happen next. The disturbing way in which Stamp seems to say nothing at all yet communicates with Roth like he's known him for years twinned with the fact panic hits him like a train later on in the film and he suddenly becomes a chatter box is an amazing juxtaposition which really adds to the experience.Another attractive aspect of the film is the setting. This also acts as a juxtaposition as the beauty and heat that oozes from the screen really counterbalances the disturbing reality that Hurt and Roth's characters are there to 'get' Stamp and make him pay for his previous actions as well as the sadistic interior that makes up Hurt's character. You can't get too caught up in the setting which you only really see when the journey is being killed off, and you know that with every second that rushes by on the road; Stamp is apparently closer to his death - clever stuff.The film is simple. The narrative is easy, there aren't too many characters to deal with, there aren't too many on screen distractions (unless you count the girl) meaning you have more reasons to focus on EXACTLY what's going on and although the film looks a little aged, I can guarantee it's thoroughly enjoyable.

Dan A petty gangster rats out his accomplices and goes into protective custody with his new-found penchant for books and thought, until one day retribution arrives in the form of two assassins. The gangster, now a philosopher who claims he is ready for death as just another step in the progression of life, is taken for a long ride across Spain so that the crime boss he ratted out can witness vengeance inflicted.Talk about your minor masterpieces! This has long been one of my favorites ever since I stumbled across it on one of the premium cable movie channels many years ago.It's hard to put my finger on just what it is, exactly, that makes this movie great. One can hardly point to substantial character development, because the characters (with one exception) never really become true flesh and blood to us. The plot meanders, truth be told. The dialog is clever but rarely brilliant. So what is it? Certainly the locations and the music, the general ambiance, add a lot to the movie. The car, the clouds of dust, the brilliant Spanish sun, the arc of azure sky, the arid hills, the sultry guitar: these things alone can turn a marginal movie into a good one. Exterior shots predominate, and with good reason. The director knew how to combine simple, pure elements--strong, bold colors, bright sunlight, stark images, and exactly the right sounds--in ways that seem to speak of things larger than themselves.But I don't mean to make the rest of the movie sound marginal. The characters aren't terribly well fleshed-out, but they are interesting nevertheless. Hurt's character, the silent, wary predator, comes across as a bit stilted, but he makes it work with his craggy face, his angular body, his croaking voice, and especially his eternally weary eyes. (Few characters could have taken on this role without looking ridiculous.) Stamp is also stilted yet convincing as the amateur philosopher and erstwhile rogue at peace with himself and his fate. Roth, even more constricted in his role, also manages to put across a convincing if thoroughly unsavory persona. These actors don't have much to work with, and yet none of them ever slips into crudely cartoonish performances. They remain genuine, to the degree their characters allow.The real surprise is the girl, Laura del Sol. Her obvious physical charms, barely stuffed into a very small dress, lead the viewer (the pop-eyed male viewer, anyway) into writing her off as mere eye candy, until the confrontation between her and Hurt, and the cruel, angry glow in her eyes, brings it home that here perhaps is the highest talent in this cast. It is she alone who stands out, at the end of the movie, as someone we can recognize and identify with; someone who isn't a mere cypher. What a pity that she has done so little else in English-speaking movies.Whether you find the ending of this movie satisfying probably says something about your own personality, and how you view concepts like loyalty, crime, vengeance, and justice. I won't go into my own reactions. I'll only say that, when the movie is over, you'll find that, not only have you watched an absorbing movie, but you probably have things to think about.