Netflix pick for 8/3/15 – ‘The Killer’

From 1989, “The Killer” is a hugely influential Hong Kong action movie, itself influenced by master filmmakers Martin Scorsese and Jean Pierre-Melville and their respective films “Mean Streets” and “Le Samourai,” and not only did this movie establish John Woo as a director of note, but it also went on to inspire people like Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino to push the action movie genre as far as it would go.

Starring Chow Yun Fat, “The Killer” is the story of a professional hitman who accidentally blinded a girl in a public shoot out, and develops a serious sense of remorse for his actions. So he helps this girl as she grows up without ever letting on that he was the one responsible for her blindness. And when she has the opportunity to undergo a procedure that would restore her sight, he takes on “one last job” in order to secure the money needed for this surgery.

Meanwhile, he has to avoid both the police constantly looking for him and local Triad mob guys who also want him dead. Rest assured, shootouts abound in this film, with the death toll reaching 12o people over the course of 111 minutes. This is the movie in which John Woo really started in on his now signature style, with crazy over the top action sequences and slow motion doves flying all over the place and just general insanity in the form of gun play, and it all makes for an entertaining as hell picture.

See for yourself and watch “The Killer” right here on the Netflix Instant.