Hit Man: Richard Linklater Reinvents The Socio-Romantic Comedy

NERDY college professor Gary suddenly discovers that he has the talent to be different people. A part-time tech guy with the police department, he stumbles into a very specific undercover gig. Gary starts to pose as a contract killer — a fabled hitman — with the mission of arresting those who try to hire his services. He begins to enjoy his work. But he’s not driven by some righteous sense of law and order. It becomes his artform. In fact, he even calibrates the characters according to the personalities of the suspects he meets. (One of his ‘aliases’ is inspired by Patrick Bateman in American Psycho.) It’s no surprise that Hit Man is co-written by Glen Powell, the impossibly good-looking actor who plays Gary. Performing — and the nature of identity — is a core theme of this funny, saucy and surprisingly romantic film. Powell is a bonafide movie star who is essentially posing as an Average Joe (the joke is that we go “yeah, right”) pretending to be a movie character. His job is to lie. And he lies his way to his own truth.

Evidently, this is also a Richard Linklater movie. Partly based on a 2001 Texas Monthly article, it takes the face-or-mask syndrome into new territory. Most Linklater movies are about people who find themselves by losing themselves: in love, space, grief, college, music. Hit Man goes one step further and suggests — through some age-old narrative tropes — that never finding yourself might be the whole point. It is very much an actor’s fantasy, arguing that there is no such thing as a single personal identity — everyone is a shapeless product of the situations they find themselves in. What matters is the moment, not the cumulative individualism that led to it. The role(s) of a fake hitman gives Gary a new lease of life. His philosophy classes in college become more interesting. He becomes hotter and more confident. His ‘default’ self — a cat-loving, bird-watching, khakee-wearing New Orleanean — makes way for an adaptable man who is everybody and nobody.

Gary likes himself the most as Ron, a slick and eligible assassin who talks an attractive client, Madison, out of killing her abusive husband. His first ‘appointment’ with her at a cafe plays out like a dating-app meet-cute: They make each other laugh, share a delicious pie and flirt a little. After she decides against pursuing his services, Gary does what most self-respecting movie characters do: He bumps into her after her divorce and they start a torrid love affair. Gary is well aware of their inherent roleplay scenario. The palpable sexual chemistry between the two comes from the thrill of sleeping with kinky fantasies of each other: He’s the hunky contract killer and she’s the lady capable of hiring one. At one point, he comes home to see her dressed as a sexy air hostess — and he can’t help but grin at the irony of their relationship. Watching him with a gun turns her on. Watching her fake innocence turns him on. Props to Adria Arjona, who turns Madison into a distinctly sensual woman. She looks perpetually aroused but in an unhinged sort of way — the kind that would’ve been a red flag for Gary, but remains the greenest of flags for Ron.

Things get messy when Madison’s ex-husband and Gary’s jealous colleague enter the fray. Hit Man does a couple of things differently here. It of course morphs into a twisted romcom. At times, his psychology lectures double up as a blatant marker of the themes. That’s the entertaining part. But it also extends the question mark of identity into a more philosophical conflict between being and desiring. Gary’s job is to nail potential and future offenders — to mine the cracks of human instinct and eke out homicidal intent from its hiding place. But is desiring a murder the same as being a murderer? The film is designed to interrogate the morality of this intent. Through the unlikely romance, then, Hit Man investigates the passion in the proverbial ‘crime of passion’ — the impulse behind hate is not unlike the one behind love. In a way, the story of Gary and Madison also highlights the role of law enforcement in the pop-culturalisation of identity. What the police department hires Gary to do is similar to what clients hire him to do. In both cases, he is expected to complete something that’s incomplete. In both cases, he is rounding up — and appropriating — the integers of human nature. His bond with Madison exposes the emotional grayness of entrapment.

It may sound weird, but Hit Man reminded me of Imtiaz Ali’s series She, where a shy female police constable who goes undercover as a sex worker discovers who — and what — she really can be. She defies the police force and crosses over to the ‘dark’ side. Hit Man is more balanced in its excavation of modern identity. I love that the system is held accountable for challenging Gary’s authenticity. He doesn’t know who he is anymore. He doesn’t know if love or hate is his catalyst. Only, this is no tragedy. His elasticity is no longer an escape. His disguise is no longer a diversion. It’s the sharpest hit for a man with multiple names.

Stream Hit Man on Netflix.