The Replacement Killers

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Movie
German title The Replacement Killers
Original title The Replacement Killers
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1998
length 98 minutes
Age rating FSK 18
Rod
Director Antoine Fuqua
script Ken Sanzel
production Bernie Brillstein
Brad Gray
music Harry Gregson-Williams
camera Peter Lyons Collister
cut Jay Lash Cassidy
occupation

The Replacement Killers is a film by Antoine Fuqua , shot in the USA in 1998.

action

The Chinese hit man John Lee is indebted to Mr. Wei, the drug lord of the USA, and therefore has to do three jobs for him. Because the policeman Stan Zedkov shot Wei's son when he was attacked, John Lee is to shoot the policeman's son in the arms of his father as a third assignment so that he can experience the feeling of losing his own son himself.

For moral reasons, John Lee does not want to kill the child and is therefore himself on the hit list of Mr. Wei, who threatens to "harm Lee's family". John Lee therefore decides to get a passport from Meg Coburn, a forger, and to protect his family in Shanghai from Wei's helpers. Michael Kogan, Mr. Weis' bodyguard, puts two substitute killers on Zedkov's son and John Lee. John Lee and Meg are able to protect Zedkov's son from the killers in a cinema.

In the finale, Mr. Wei and Michael Kogan are killed. Zedkov lets John and Meg go instead of arresting them. John then returns to Asia to protect his family. Meg says goodbye to him at the airport and gives him false passports for the whole family as a parting present.

Reviews

The lexicon of international films judges: "Conventional action film, which apart from spectacular action scenes and an exaggerated soundscape has nothing to offer and, above all, deprives itself of any interest due to the sloppy drawing of the people."

Roger Ebert sees Die Ersatzkiller as a glossy version of a Hong Kong action film, the main character of which, Chow Yun-Fat, has a certain sadness that reminds him of Charles Bronson . He also emphasizes the simplicity of form and its richness of visuals ("simplicity of form and its richness of visuals") of Antoine Fuqua's debut film, which celebrates the world of images in Hong Kong action cinema ("a ballet of Hong Kong action imagery: bodies rolling out of gunshot range, faces frozen in fear, guys toppling off fire escapes [...] "). Together with cameraman Peter Lyons Collister, the director succeeds in making the material quality of what is shown on the screen tangible (“gets a sensuous texture onto the screen that makes you feel the roughness of walls, the clamminess of skin, the coldness of guns ").

Despite the thin plot, according to James Berardinelli , thanks to non-stop action and persistent visual stimulation (“nearly non-stop action and the constant visual stimulation”) it is almost impossible to be bored with the film (“virtually impossible to be bored”). The choreography of the fight scenes, as well as the careful use of light and shadow and the richness of the color scheme, are reminiscent of films by John Woo ("The action sequences all have the same kind of choreographed style evident in Woo's films [...] . The presentation [...] is also very Woo-like, featuring the meticulous use of light and shadow, and a rich palette of colors that saturate certain scenes with reds, ambers, greens, and blues ").

Others

  • For Til Schweiger, who doesn't say a single word in the film, this is his first Hollywood film.
  • The film production cost about 30 million US dollars . Worldwide revenues amounted to approximately 35.1 million US dollars, of which just under 19 million were in the USA.
  • Mira Sorvino only accepted the role after the advice of her then partner Quentin Tarantino .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for The Replacement Killers - Die Ersatzkiller . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , October 2006 (PDF; The Replacement Killers - Die Ersatzkiller - Extended Cut).
  2. ^ The Replacement Killers. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  3. ↑ Roger Ebert: Replacement Killers , Chicago Sun-Times , February 6, 1998
  4. ↑ James Berardinelli: The Replacement Killers Box Office , ReelViews, 1998
  5. ↑ IMDb: Box Office