‘Hit Man’ REVIEW: The many faces of Glen Powell
‘Hit Man’ REVIEW: The many faces of Glen Powell
“All pie is good pie.”
Hit Man follows Gary Johnson (Glen Powell), a University of New Orleans professor, who also works as a fake hitman for the New Orleans police. His life takes a risky turn when he falls in love with a “client,” an attractive married woman, Madison Figueroa Masters (Adria Arjona).
Adapted from the 2001 Texas Monthly magazine article by American writer and journalist Skip Hollandsworth, Hit Man is helmed by Oscar-nominated director Richard Linklater (the Before trilogy, Boyhood, Dazed and Confused), who also produced and co-wrote the screenplay with Powell.
Adria Arjona as Madison and Glen Powell as Gary Johnson, Ron, Dean, Nico, and Tanner in a poster of Hit Man / Photo taken from Vague Visages
Much of the film’s positives lean in Powell’s skills as an actor, with his rise to mainstream territory in the films Top Gun: Maverick and Anyone But You, the latter being a testament that he’s on his way as one of Hollywood’s next leading men. He’s got the chops, but under Linklater’s direction and their collaboration with the film, Powell gets to be an enigmatic beast in this one.
With the number of disguises and characters, this can be quite overdone. But the film makes sure to give each “disguise” enough time to shine. Powell’s smooth character changes one after the other to showcase how he’s perfectly cast in the role.
With the film being somewhat dialogue-heavy, particularly in the first act, the variety and quirky characters Powell pulls off bring another layer to the film’s storytelling.
Gary Johnson (Powell) in Hit Man / Photo taken from IMDB
The screenplay and how it’s very loosely based on the real-life story of Gary Johnson makes it even more interesting to see how it dramatizes this story about a fake hitman. With Linklater and Powell working so closely together, it is present in the way we see and feel his presence in the film.
But perhaps with its strength in the main lead comes a bit of a shortcoming with his chemistry with Arjona’s Madison. Although the film isn’t completely leaning towards the romantic-comedy route, the chemistry between the two leads isn’t really that convincing.
Arjona shines in the scenes she’s in, but it’s clear how the screenplay focused so much on the chameleon-changing escapades as the romantic scenes involving the two don’t bring that much to the table. Which again, will only be an issue if you’re expecting Linklater to go back to his Before trilogy roots.
But on the bright side, the mystery behind Madison’s character and true intentions are enough to keep us hooked and locked in.
Madison (Arjona) and “Ron” (Powell) in Hit Man / Photo from IMDB
This leads us to how the film concludes. For a good solid final 30 minutes, Hit Man shoots and scores. However, it feels like it’s rushingly wrapping things up at the last minute, which was already anchored by a solid build-up for a homerun.
Gary Johnson taking on multiple disguises could be a good entry point into an identity crisis of sorts, which was only teased in the film. Expectations aside, the film is at its high with great performances and subtly funny dialogue that the negatives are put aside like a rotten old pie.
Overall, Hit Man isn’t a huge hit nor a gigantic miss, but it showcases Powell’s immense skills as an actor and how Linklater still got it as a director with no signs of stopping. It’d be exciting to see these two collaborate once again soon.
Hit Man is streaming exclusively on Netflix.
