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Whatever enthusiasm I had for John Madden's Elmore Leonard adaptation dissipated over a year ago. It looked for a time like it might go direct to video, but now the Weinsteins will supposedly giving the film a wide theatrical release on November 7 -- nearly three years after it wrapped. Perhaps they are looking to capitalize on Mickey Rourke Fever, a phenomenon that looks sure to play prominently in Oscar season, based on early reviews of The Wrestler. Diane Lane, Thomas Jane, Joseph Gordon Levitt, and Rosario Dawson round out Killshot's cast.

I too have been anticipating this since the trailer debuted some time last year. I'm hoping the Weinstein's constant bumping of the release date has more to do with their recent woes rather than the quality of the film.

The film's release date has been bumped again to an undetermined early 2009 date.

Harvey says the film we be released a few weeks before the Oscars to capitalize on Rourke's inevitable Oscar nod for The Wrestler.

So it's getting released this Friday. On five screens. In Phoneix.

Why only in Phoenix?

Will it's success(if any) in that city really determine its release date or distribution

Dadapass wrote:Why only in Phoenix?

Will it's success(if any) in that city really determine its release date or distribution

Probably because screens in any other major city are filled with Oscar films that have gone/will be given a wider release post-nominations. The Weinsteins claim if it does well in Phoenix they'll expand, but by any other measure, they're dumping the film.

DVDTalk on the DVD

Saw this on a plane and holy shit, this is all kinds of terrible. It's hard to believe that a film boasting this kind of talent - Mickey Rourke, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Thomas Jane, Diane Lane, Rosario Dawson - and Madden behind the camera is beyond direct-to-video bad. Watching the film, it's hard to tell if it was just edited all to hell or if the script was just this awful to begin with. (btw, it seems "airplane versions", at least on Delta, are a thing of the past. Basically their system allows you to choose from a bunch of movies to watch on your own screen. This thing had full front nudity, swearing etc all intact so it's definitely not content editing that fucked this thing up).

I'm not going to get into the overly convoluted plot, except to say that its preposterous, with enough plot holes to make watching this exhausting. Let's just say the idea of coupling the "one last job" hitman genre with the "troubled relationship tested by adversity" subplot is just awful. And while the idea of Mickey Rourke playing a Native American hitman called Bluebird is hilarious, the fact that he (and the rest of the cast) are actually quite good only make watching this thing all the more painful.

The Weinsteins dumped this for good reason. Ungodly awful, this is the worst Elmore Leonard adaptation of all time. That's right, I would rather watch Be Cool than to have to sit through this again.