Hollywood’s 10 Best Contract Killers

Hollywood has a number of contract killers like John Wick, but which are the best? This list narrows down ten of them.

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Cleaners, mechanics, butchers, exterminators, icemen, house painters, liquidators, torpedoes, button men, wet boys – there are several slang terms used to avoid explicitly naming the taboo vocation of contract killers – people who can be hired to kill for top dollar.

Freelancers paid per job, a few things differentiate contract killers from other assassins. They can’t be loyal to a single mob or crime organization (unless it’s a contract killing firm) because that makes them a hitman. They can’t work for a government, and they can’t restrict themselves to outlaw targets, because then they’d be bounty hunters. An exciting and mysterious profession, contract killers are often the subject of movies, and these are cinema’s ten best.

10 Bullet-Tooth Tony – Snatch (2000)

If contract killers were judged on their ability to fire off witty quips and insults, Bullet-Tooth Tony (Vinnie Jones) would hold the top spot, but unfortunately, that’s not the case.

As the legend goes, the brutal Tony stood laughing after being shot point-blank six times by a target. Two of those shots hit his mouth and remained there forever, earning him his moniker. Tony’s kill count in Snatch isn’t high, but he impressively kills Boris the Bullet Dodger (Rade Serbedzija), who you may gather from his name is difficult to kill.

9 Martin Blank – Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)

A charming comedic thriller, Grosse Pointe Blank sees Martin Blank (John Cusack) as a contract killer at the top of his game, but is uninterested in joining the contract killers’ union that his business rival – Grocer (Dan Aykroyd) – asks him to join.

At the suggestion of his secretary (Joan Cusack) and therapist (Alan Arkin), Blank reluctantly decides to return to his hometown of Grosse Pointe, Michigan for his high school reunion. He reconnects with his old flame, but not without having to first show off his abilities by using a variety of weapons to kill several people.

8 Vincent – Collateral (2004)

Vincent (Tom Cruise) is a contract killer who likes to be efficient in his work in Collateral. When he arrives in Los Angeles to knock out several contracts in one night, he hires a cab driver named Max (Jamie Foxx) to drive him around to a series of stops for a “real estate deal.”

While Vincent may be adept at killing, he’s not very discreet, and is quickly forced to reveal his true vocation to Max, who becomes Vincent’s hostage for the remainder of their exciting cat-and-mouse story.

7 Jackie Cogan – Killing Them Softly (2012)

Jackie (Brad Pitt) doesn’t derive any joy from his profession, he does what he does because it pays damn well. When he’s called in to restore order to an organized crime community by finding and killing the men who robbed a mafia card game, he shows how good he is at his job.

Jackie explains that to keep emotions out of the process, he prefers to kill his targets quickly and softly from a distance, hence the title Killing Them Softly, which is currently streaming on Netflix.

6 John & Jane Smith – Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005)

The movie where Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie famously met and fell in love, Mr. & Mrs. Smith features the two actors playing a pair of assassins working for different contract killing firms. As talented as they are at killing their targets, they lack the awareness to realize each other’s true identities.

When John and Jane do finally discover that they’re one another’s covers and assigned to kill each other, they resolve instead to unite and turn the tables on their respective employers, saving their marriage and showing off their abilities in the process.

5 Arthur Bishop – The Mechanic (1972, 2011)

Being a great killer isn’t always a matter of sheer body count, sometimes it’s about the way a hit is performed. First portrayed by Charles Bronson and later Jason Statham, if a murder needs to look like an accident, no killer is better for the job than Arthur Bishop.

Possessing extreme focus and patience, Bishop breaks down his meticulous approach to his trade when he takes on an apprentice in The Mechanic. Always several mental steps ahead of his opponents, Bishop is the only induction to the list who managed to carry out a posthumous hit.

4 Léon Montana – Léon: The Professional (1994)

Another story about a contract killer and his apprentice, Natalie Portman saw her acting debut as Mathilda, a 12-year-old girl taken in by her neighbor – skilled assassin Léon Montana (Jean Reno) – after her family is murdered by a corrupt DEA agent (Gary Oldman) in Léon: The Professional.

Both extremely emotionally damaged, it’s moving to watch the relationship between Léon and Mathilda blossom into something beautiful, complex, and healing for them as he reluctantly agrees to train her to kill as he does so she can avenge her family.

3 Anton Chigurh – No Country For Old Men (2007)

After a hunter (Josh Brolin) finds a briefcase of money at a botched drug deal, his blessing turns out to be a curse when he’s relentlessly pursued by the vicious man the cartel hires to retrieve their money – Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) – in 2007’s best picture: No Country for Old Men.

Armed with a captive bolt stunner and often deciding victims’ fates with a coin toss, Bardem won an Oscar for his portrayal of this unstoppable reaper-like force of death, and rightfully so, as every word he speaks and every step he takes drips with chilling tension.

2 The Bride – Kill Bill: Vol. 1 & 2 (2003, 2004)

Already the most prolific killer in the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad – the world’s top contract killing firm in Quentin Tarantino’s two-part kung fu tale – The Bride (Uma Thurman) took her game to a new level after her team betrayed and almost killed her at her wedding rehearsal in Kill Bill.

Trained by the legendary master Pai Mei (Gordon Liu), and armed with the finest katana ever crafted by master swordsmith Hattori Hanzo (Sonny Chiba), The Bride leaves an unbelievable trail of blood, gore, and bodies in her path to revenge.

1 John Wick – The ‘John Wick’ Franchise

John Wick (Keanu Reeves) is often referred to as “The Boogeyman”, not because he’s actually the Boogeyman, but because he’s the guy you send if you want to kill the Boogeyman.

Considered one of the greatest assassins to ever exist, Wick was happily living a peaceful life of retirement, but then some Russian punks decided to kill his dog and steal his car, prompting Wick to return to his vocation. Three movies and a staggering 299 kills later, John Wick is unquestionably cinema’s contract killer. His fourth chapter is currently set to release in May 2021.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/hollywoods-best-contract-killers-john-wick-kill-bill/