Killing Them Softly (KTS) isn’t a movie for the faint-hearted – but despite its guns and gore, it isn’t an all-out action flick either. Instead, it inhabits a shadowy half-land between thriller and dark comedy, where wanna-be gangsters wear washing-up gloves to a heist, a hit-man dismisses a businessman’s fear of murder – preferring severe beating instead – as “total corporate mentality”, an assassin says, “Killing someone can get embarrassing. Touchy-feely. I like to kill them softly – from a distance.”
Jackie Cogan’s (Pitt) distance from his victims doesn’t make his heart grow fonder though. Pitt plays an emotion-less killer who manages murderers and does the dirty himself, stabbing friends, shooting the guileless, turning comrades to the cops. Cogan’s cynicism coats everything, even 2008’s Democrat Barack Obama who, on TV, bravely rallies a Bush-ed America. “This guy wants to tell me we’re living in a community,” Cogan hisses to his corporate client (Jenkins). “Don’t make me laugh. We’re living in America and you’re on your own. America’s not a country. It’s just a business. Now fupay me.”
KTS showcases an America devastated by recession, its underbelly worst-hit as mobsters must turn on their own, their pistols controlled by penny-pinching corporates. It’s a smart, sardonic view and despite some self-indulgent flailing, it captures the fear, loathing and loss of those caught against the American machine. As deadpan Jackie, Pitt oozes starry radiance, sometimes too glossy for his dark protagonist. His looking fabulous in every frame is a distraction – although, amidst people’s brains being blown out, not always unwelcome. McNairy’s remarkable as a boisterous bandit frightened witless, Gandolfini superb as Mickey, a fat, boozy, over-sexed hit-man, flown in “coach” for a job he’s not upto, everyone wrapped within a dreamy soundtrack that provocatively slides against the gore onscreen.
KTS’s real star is actually its sound – rain pattering upon a Cadillac to crickets chirruping just before someone gets shot, olives bobbing in a Martini to police sirens wailing in the wind, KTS captures America’s enormity, emptiness and excitement – often killing the listener with silence. And some dynamite lines.
Cast:
Brad Pitt, Scoot McNairy, Richard Jenkins, James Gandolfini
Direction: Andrew Dominik
Genre: Thriller
Duration:
1 hour 38 minutes
Story:
When a rich-boy poker game gets robbed, hit-man Jackie Cogan hunts those involved – what does Jackie mean by killing them softly?