Robert Rath (Sylvester Stallone) is a hit-man who just wants to retire from the business. When he loses out on payment for his last contract when an unknown rival Miguel Bain (Antonio Banderas)takes out his contract before he had the chance, Rath agrees to take on another job on 4 Dutch Buyers who are intent on buying a disc from Electra (Julianne Moore) who is the mark who Rath has been assigned to kill. The trouble is that there is no intel on Electra making it tricky for Rath to find her. By the time, Rath does find her, Bain is already on the scene, but Bain locates the buyers rather than the mark. Rath then tricks Bain into thinking that he has killed Electra. Rath soon begins to realise that the Contractor is playing both himself and Bain off against each other and tries to find out who's doing it and why whilst also trying to stay one step ahead of his deadly rival.
When watching films, I sometimes have to say to myself 'Come on, it's only a film, don't take it so seriously' and for the most part I can suspend disbelief, but there were some things in this film that just didn't make sense....
1) Bain gets arrested by the police early on, but manages to slip his cuffs and escape killing about 3 maybe 4 police officers in the process. Due to the nature of his escape and due to the fact that he killed a few officers made me think to myself 'Wow!! Bain will end up being one of the most wanted men in the city', but after the early police presence we see no police officers pursuing either Rath or Bain that in spite of the number of people Bain kills throughout the film. It just wasn't believable.
2) We also are expected to accept that Bain has a skeleton made of steel - he gets crushed between a car and a bus (whilst they're both moving) and also gets blown out of a third floor window. On both occasions, he seems to suffer no 'ill effects' - it's an action thriller so I can probably let this one slide, but it still kind of annoys me.
3)In the closing stages of the film, it's revealed that the 'Contractor' was the guy who Rath was ordered to kill 15 years ago. Rath believed that the 'Contractor' was dead, but Rath fired at the Contractor's heart and the 'Contractor' had some sort of prosthetic shell covering his heart due to the fact that he knew Rath would aim for his heart. This was quite a nice twist and it explains why he targeted and set up Rath, but why was he stringing Bain along? It's possible that the 'Contractor' may have played Rath and Bain off against each other purely for his own amusement and in order for Rath to prove that he truly is the best, but this is unclear.
All in all, if you take this film as it is then it is an entertaining and fairly decent thriller. Considering it's 130 minutes long, it actually moves at a reasonably good pace with only the odd sag here and there. Despite my gripes above, I did enjoy the film and would say that it's worth a look.
When watching films, I sometimes have to say to myself 'Come on, it's only a film, don't take it so seriously' and for the most part I can suspend disbelief, but there were some things in this film that just didn't make sense....
1) Bain gets arrested by the police early on, but manages to slip his cuffs and escape killing about 3 maybe 4 police officers in the process. Due to the nature of his escape and due to the fact that he killed a few officers made me think to myself 'Wow!! Bain will end up being one of the most wanted men in the city', but after the early police presence we see no police officers pursuing either Rath or Bain that in spite of the number of people Bain kills throughout the film. It just wasn't believable.
2) We also are expected to accept that Bain has a skeleton made of steel - he gets crushed between a car and a bus (whilst they're both moving) and also gets blown out of a third floor window. On both occasions, he seems to suffer no 'ill effects' - it's an action thriller so I can probably let this one slide, but it still kind of annoys me.
3)In the closing stages of the film, it's revealed that the 'Contractor' was the guy who Rath was ordered to kill 15 years ago. Rath believed that the 'Contractor' was dead, but Rath fired at the Contractor's heart and the 'Contractor' had some sort of prosthetic shell covering his heart due to the fact that he knew Rath would aim for his heart. This was quite a nice twist and it explains why he targeted and set up Rath, but why was he stringing Bain along? It's possible that the 'Contractor' may have played Rath and Bain off against each other purely for his own amusement and in order for Rath to prove that he truly is the best, but this is unclear.
All in all, if you take this film as it is then it is an entertaining and fairly decent thriller. Considering it's 130 minutes long, it actually moves at a reasonably good pace with only the odd sag here and there. Despite my gripes above, I did enjoy the film and would say that it's worth a look.