By Scott Martin

The American, USA, 2010

Directed by Anton Corbijn

This is a film that exists nervously in the pits of our stomachs. Director Anton Corbijn knows the value of undue paranoia and cleverly exploits his characters’ emotional states, birthing a labyrinth of intrigue and questionable motives. Butterflies are present throughout the entire film, existing as both a motif and symbolism for our lead character’s life. He has a butterfly tattoo on his hand; he falls asleep reading a book regarding butterflies. People begin to know him by this trademark. In fact, it’s one of only a few truths we have about him: he’s interested in butterflies, he kills people for a living, and his weakness (like any classic movie character) is love, and in a film as patient and caring as this one, we’re afforded the time to focus on all of these truths.

The story itself is fairly simple: an assassin hides in Italy while conducting his last assignment. He is given a task by his boss, Pavel (Johan Leysen), to assist another assassin with a weapons exchange. He builds her a gun. During his stay, he befriends a priest and a prostitute. The dynamic in all of these relationships is the existence of sin. Despite the warm world that Corbijn creates for us, there is an underlying sense of dread throughout the project. He assigns a color palette to the film from the first frame, using warm earth tones to put his audience at ease. Our prostitute is given her own opposing colors, and by the end we don’t know which spectra to trust. It’s the understanding of small detail that Corbijn shows that is the genuine pay-off for his audience, if we pay close attention. Read More