Killers

Killers is pretty much what you’d expect a romantic action comedy starring Ashton Kutcher and Katherine Heigl to be – formulaic, not particularly good, but serviceable enough that you won’t be throwing things at the screen. It’s from the school of filmmaking that feels that if you aim low enough, you’re bound to reach your mark and create something bland, inoffensive but marketable. And apparently that’s preferable to aiming higher, where you might create something great, but there’s also a chance you’ll end up with an absolute stinker.

Kutcher seems to have an incredible nose for these sitcom level movies that demand little from him (and where even so he often under-delivers), and has filled his CV with them for the better part of a decade, while Heigl seems to be following suit and risks ruining a promising film career if she doesn’t choose her movies with a bit more care. That’s especially true as neither of them seems right here, despite somewhat playing to type.

Kutcher play a smooth, debonair professional assassin called Spencer, who meets the ditzy Jen (Heigl) while she’s on holiday in France trying to get over a break-up. The two fall madly in love with each and get married – the only thing being that he doesn’t tell her the part where he actually kills people for a living. But maybe it doesn’t matter as he’s going to give that up to live a normal life with his wife. Cut to three years later, and Spencer and Jen’s domestic bliss is interrupted when it’s discovered that someone has taken out a hit of Spencer, and now everyone and their dog is out to kill him.

Cue Heigl shrieking a lot after discover what her husband’s former job was, as well as the fact that bullets are flying at her seemingly everywhere she goes. It also turns out most of the people they thought were their white-bread suburban idyll friends and neighbours, are actually sleepers who would like nothing more than to kill Spencer.

Hollywood really does seem to have the lost the art of the screwball yarn, so that while we should watch Killers and just be able to revel in the romance, action and fun, instead it’s difficult not to keep wondering whether you’ve completely missed something vital because so little of it makes sense, and it’s not entertaining enough to completely cover that up. That’s partly due to the fact Kutcher and Heigl lack the chemistry and nous to make the implausible seem fun enough that you’re willing to go along for the ride. Instead Kutcher tends to sleepwalk through the film, while Heigl overplays it.

As I said, the movie aims low, so that while there’s not a lot of wit, sparkle, humour, romance or action spectacle, there’s a small amount of each, so it can tick all the ‘date movie’ boxes. It’s a film that doesn’t take enough risks to be a flat-out failure, instead coasting along in a not-loathsome fashion. You’re unlikely to hate it, but similarly I’d be surprised if most viewers didn’t wish the Killers was a whole lot better than it is.

Overall Verdict: It tick the boxes, but an implausible plot, lack of chemistry between the actors and a seemingly little desire on anyone’s part to make it more than ok, mean there’s little to recommend Killers, but little to hate it for either.

Reviewer: Phil Caine