(Long Island, N.Y.) The American was an unexpected pleasure for me. Quiet, moody, and above all else, atmospheric, it’s an
odd little movie and certainly not one you’d expect to open in first place at the box office. But that Windows 8.1 Standard Key online it did, and the world is a better place for it.
Jack (George Clooney) is an assassin. One day while hanging around his remote, snowbound cabin in Sweden with his lady friend, Jack comes under fire from some mysterious thugs. Establishing that Jack is indeed no run-of-the mill hit-man but a ruthless and talented killer, he easily takes out Buy Windows 8.1 Enterprise Key Code his attackers with a hidden firearm. Then, just to prove that he’s
a romantic
smoothie at heart, Jack plugs his lady friend in the back of the head as well; turns out she saw too much. Needless to say the [something the rhymes with spit]
has hit the fan, and Jack is told by his boss Pavel (Johan Leysen) to head to a little mountain town in Italy to lay low for a while.
While holed up in his dingy little apartment, Jack passes the time by doing pushups, swilling wine with the local priest, Father Benedetto (Paolo Bonacelli), and doing completely unsanitary things with a local prostitute named Clara (Violante Placido). But mostly, Jack just mopes around. You see, like all seasoned assassins, Jack has grown weary of the trade and the isolation that comes with it, and wants out. He tells his boss this fact, and shockingly, he accepts his employee’s decision…but, of course, he just needs him to do one last job first. However, Jack doesn’t have to pull the trigger; he just has to provide another killer with the weapon of her choice.
Mathilde (Thekla Reuten), the hit-man…er, hit-woman in question, shows up and details the specs of a custom sniper rifle that Jack then constructs for her. While building the weapon, the events in Sweden catch up with Jack; he notices people following him nightly, and eventually it leads to gunfire as an attempt is made on his life. Things get even more complicated as things ramp up emotionally with Clara (why do guys always fall in love with hookers in movies? That’s just gross), and Pavel starts giving off a vibe that perhaps he’s not so happy about Jack leaving his employ after all…
The American is everything modern movies are not: it’s slow-paced, smoothly shot, and edited with restraint. In that sense, it’s actually extremely refreshing compared to the ADD-inspired film-making of today. There’s not much in the way of story, and even dialogue is kept on the light side, but the film is more effective that way; it is steeped deeply in it’s dark and brooding atmosphere, and what story is revealed only serves to make the proceedings all the more engrossing. This isn’t a story about what people did in their past, so much as a tale of what they’re doing right now.
George Clooney gives a surprisingly restrained performance, portraying Jack as silent yet emotional, detached yet longing for someone to love…well, I should say, someone to love that he doesn’t have to shoot in the head when she catches
an eyeball of something she shouldn’t have. As a result, we have a character
with all-too-human frailties, both emotional and physical, yet still a frighteningly effective and intelligent killer when the need arises.
The rest of the cast were unknowns…well, at least unknown to me, but everyone else did their job, and did it
well.
The locations, including snow-encrusted Sweden and Castelvecchio, a small town in the mountains of Abruzzo, Italy, were all uniformly breathtaking and yet barren and secluded, adding to the feeling of loneliness. But the quiet nature of The American only serves to underscore its action scenes all the more. And speaking of action scenes, there are few, but to be honest, that’s okay. The film doesn’t need the crutch of things blowing up every five seconds to carry it along to its (sadly, somewhat lame) conclusion.
The American was one of the better movies I’ve seen in recent memory, and yet another solid effort by George Clooney, who shows a delicate range here that will serve to remind moviegoers how underrated he can be as a dramatic actor. Highly recommended.
