The Hit List (1993)

Fahey is good here actually...the story's ok enough, its got all the classic ingredients of a solid film noir--its got a potential femme fatale, its got a decent enough boss character played by a great veteran actor (in this case James Coburn), its got a hero who is talked into murdering a guy who's giving a woman a lot of trouble....I just 100% described "Double Indemnity" which this movie is nowhere near the quality of...but for once its not the screenplay's fault so much as it is the pacing of the film...it is sloooow moving from plot point to plot point. Slow and rather somber too. A movie like this, i'm not asking for it to be funny but a couple of wry tossed off one liners here or there would've been very effective. Instead we get a lot of Fahey grimacing over him violating his own code. (Hmmm an assassin with his own moral code...where have i seen that before???) That said, its not terrible, if you stumble across it as I did, its worth a look if only for Fahey's very solid performance. (Coburn is good in his handful of scenes too, but unfortunately he's not really given much to do beyond look concerned and issue some ominous warnings about Fahey getting too close) Again its not a terrible movie, but its just too slowly paced for its own good. (I did like the jazz score to it tho, those opening credits are very engaging and seem to promise a better movie largely due to that score)

Charlie Pike is an ex-military assassin working for the Committee – a group of lawyers who enforce their own version of justice where they rep rich drug dealers to protect their reputation then kill their clients by using Pike, who engineers the deaths to look like accidents or natural causes. After his last job, Pike decides to retire but is given a favour by Committee head Peter Mayhew to help a family friend who is being menaced by her late husband's business partner. Pike agrees to kill the partner, but when he discovers that the target was a former comrade turned government informant, he suspects that something is not quite right about this job. And when various assassins attempt to kill him, he realises that he has walked into a deadly trap of his own making.William Webb will be known these days as being the DOP for the hit military cop show NCIS. But back in the early 1990s, he made The Hit List, a B-grade thriller starring the likes of Jeff Fahey & James Coburn.The film is a routine thriller, nothing more, nothing less. But the plot is interesting enough to make this worth a watch for B-film enthusiasts & the fact that Fahey gives a good performance & James Coburn is as sinister as ever. The relationship between Fahey's assassin & Yancy Butler's double-dealing client is rocky given her duplicity but does hold by a tiny thread. The ending is a little weak but does have that Romeo & Juliet feel to it that makes it watchable.

This film starts by giving you the impression you are in for a good show (b movie or not), right from the outake you are presented with a far from unattractive sexually active blonde and Jeff Fahey (someone I regard as a good actor) preparing to do something nasty with a suppressed gun and a container of rather deadly looking pills! This is where the impression quickly wears off. The plot is very weak making it impossible to take your eyes off the screen in fear of getting lost in the film should you decide to do so. The action is also very weak and never really takes off, something which is usually a necessity in order to save a film with a plot as tender as this. I never have been a big fan of Yancy Butler but have never been one to complain about her removing her clothes, something which this film also shy's away from bar once. I cannot think of one reason to recommend this film for viewing, so basically don't watch it....

Charlie Pike is an ex-Government agent turned contract killer. He kills on behalf of lawyer Peter Mahew who is part of a committee of lawyers who hand out their own version of justice. Pike takes a job from Mahew to help out a family friend, the beautiful Jordan. However when Pike completes the contract he falls for Jordan, a situation that leads him into a double crossing situation where deception leads to murder.When the wonderfully creative people in the TVM business sit down to really push the envelope on a project they really go for it. Imagine the planning meeting for this! `hey, lets make a thriller about a hitman who is ruthless, but really a good guy who is sensitive and listens to classical music', `yeah – and lets have him be kind but tough – and trying to get out of the business except this one last job'. After that how else can they make it really stand out – well lets shoot it all in blues and shadow of TVM noir and have the usual jazz soundtrack to add `atmosphere' and `mood'.Nothing in the plot or film really manages to be different from any other TVM you'd see and it fails to engage simply for this reason. On top of the cliché ridden film we have an obvious bit of casting with Fahey and Butler (neither strangers to this tvm stuff). The only surprise was Coburn who I imagine has let stuff like this slip off his CV since he got his Oscar.Overall this is so very predictable and clichéd that it really fails to inspire even a little bit of interest. We have every staple of the thriller/noir TVM – soft porn, jazz music, unimaginative direction – it's all here. It's not a bad film, just a very flat one that has all the appeal of a mass produced industrial production when compared to something clever or inspired.