Don Siegel
Contratto per uccidere

Filmed in 1964 as a television remake of the noir "The Killers" by Robert Siodmak, itself inspired by a short story by Hemingway, "Contract to Kill" was deemed "too violent" by the NBC network and was therefore released in theaters as "Ernest Hemingway's The Killers": a misleading title, since Don Siegel's film remains distant from both Siodmak and Hemingway. Immersed in the cold yet vibrant colors of Richard Rawlings’ Technicolor, paced by Siegel’s sharp and incisive direction, "Contract to Kill" is above all a frosty representation of the (im)poetic universe of its director, characterized by violence, deceit, and cruelty.

The story of hitmen Charlie (Lee Marvin) and Lee (Clu Gulager), in search of the sum of money stolen from their last victim Johnny North (John Cassavetes), the film also tells - through the series of central flashbacks - the story of North himself, a former race car driver who, after partially losing his sight in a race, is dragged by Sheila (Angie Dickinson), the woman he loves, into a robbery organized by gangster Jack Browning (Ronald Reagan).

The search for the money will end in a general massacre, with tones closer to Elizabethan tragedy than a pre-Tarantino style. Siegel's pessimism could not be more radical: behind his style, as dry as abstraction, lies the chilling portrait of a world devoid of morality and especially emotion, where everyone betrays everyone in the name of their own gain. From Siodmak’s romantic cynicism, there’s been a progression to an inescapable nihilism: coherently, the "rotten inside" yet still capable of feeling dark lady of classic noir has become a greedy deceiver willing to do anything for money. Johnny North, the only character with some humanity (John Cassavetes's great performance brilliantly infuses warmth and truth into the character) will inevitably end up crushed between the gears of such a ruthless world: after losing everything (sight, love, money) he can only await in silence the two killers sent to finish him, with the awareness that "he’s already dead" a long time ago.

Siegel introduces us to this universe without hesitation, with a brutality unmatched in classic American cinema. The opening - the murder of Johnny North in a home for the blind, executed by the two killers with the methodical calmness of those doing their job (this indeed, very Tarantino-esque) - is a textbook page, phenomenal for its rhythm, cadence, almost expressionist use of color and framing. Later, the style becomes less agitated and calmer, yet retains its starkness, with an unforgettable climactic finale.

The admirable skill of the director, here truly in one of his (not infrequent) states of grace, is supported by a very capable cast: besides Cassavetes, Lee Marvin’s iconic "wooden face," the talented and beautiful Angie Dickinson, one cannot fail to mention future president Ronald Reagan, solid but effective, here in his last cinematic role and his only villain role (which he reportedly regretted later on).