Review // THE AMERICAN

The American is a very handsome letdown.
As far as HD Blu-Ray's go, you can't do much better than this gorgeous transfer of photographer-turned filmmaker, Anton Corjbin's take on the Lonely Hitman movie. It's precisely the static, patient shooting style of Corjbin that distinguishes him from the pack of new directors pulled from the music video world, and it's what makes this film pop on disc. There isn't a lot of flash or frenzy like there is in most modern spy/assassin movies. This is no Bourne movie with steadicam blurs and headache-inducing "verite". Corbjin prefers to rely on his expert eye and sense of exquisite composition, grabbing and holding your attention with his striking images. However, it's only the images that are worthy of attention because the story of a disconnected hitman is dead-on-arrival.

Like I said, the movie looks fantastic, transforming your flat screen into a window onto old-world European vistas that will make anybody want to strap on their backpack and dust off their copy of Europe On $10 A Day. The problem is that the movie can't succeed on beauty and window-dressing alone. The American is cold right through to the center and unsatisfying for not breaking with the cliches of the moralizing hitman movie formula. If The American had've been released in the late 60's, it would probably be hailed as a classic. But in 2010, it feels old-fashioned and more than a little derivative. The Lonely Assassin cliche has continuously popped up in pop culture in either subtle hints (Day of the Jackal), sentimental character explorations (Leon, Road to Perdition) and even comedic deconstructions (Gross Pointe Blank). The American is definitely the brooding, sentimental type and casts Clooney as a killer and fixer who lives apart from humanity, darting in and out of the shadows of society's fringe. We are meant to pity his solitary life filled with paranoia, night terrors and haunted conscience. I think we are even meant to pity the fact that this chosen life has forced him to murder his girlfriend in order to ensure his own survival, which is a bizarre request to make of an audience in return for only the handsome despondency of Clooney. And when again Clooney reaches out for human contact, to a stunningly hot prostitute no less, I believe we are meant to approve of his character's almost defiant grasp to regain his humanity. I don't know about all that, but I certainly approved of his love interest's full 70's bush.

The American wallows in the loneliness of a hired killer's life, trying to create a mood piece, but really just delivering a downer. And Clooney reaching out to a priest and a prostitute--thin archetypes--strips the film of even more credibility--I may not have, but I feel like I've seen this character triangle a hundred times before. Clooney's character wears a constant mask of sadness and self-pity, making him a slave to emotions that he should feel, not necessarily the ones he would. If at least 50 years of cinema has taught us anything, it's that assassins are fucking cool, if maybe a little warped, and yes, sometimes lonely, but fucking cooool. But Clooney's assassin, while skilled and cunning, is such a sad-sack that it calls into question the very motivations of an assassin or why anyone would turn to it as a life choice. The American takes the implied sense of isolation and dislocation to such melodramatic heights that it actually made me see the absurdity of the profession for the first time (and like everyone else I've seen a shitload of hitman movies). Sleeping on dusty cots in rustic quarters, waking suddenly in a cold sweat with a gun at the ready, murdering the woman you love just to cover your tracks--WHY WOULD ANYONE DO THIS JOB?

I like Clooney as a movie star and I think this type of movie is exactly what he should be doing, but The American needed to match its gorgeous visuals with something new to say. Telling us that the shadowy people who kill for a living get awfully lonely is something most of us already grasped 30 or so movies ago. The "twist", which is telegraphed in its lead up, is also heavy-handed and makes you call into question quite a bit of what you've seen previously. By the time the climax rolls around, with Clooney chasing his prey through the village's religious ceremony, the sense of deja vu and disappointment becomes overwhelming.