1964 Universal Pictures, originally made for NBC.
Starring: Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, John Cassavetes, Ronald Reagan, Clu
Director: Don Siegel
Available at Amazon in a two-fer with the 1946 film.
This is the second film adaptation of Hemingway's short story. It was intended to be the first made-for-TV movie, but NBC decided it was too violent for network television, so Universal released it to theaters instead. The Killers is also notable for being Ronald Reagan's last film role before he entered politics, and the only project where he played a villain. Reagan, according to Kirk Douglas' autobiography, hated the movie because he slaps Angie Dickinson in one scene, and he was fearful that one scene would sabotage his political career.
Also, both Steve McQueen and George Peppard were considered for the role of Johnny North, before John Cassavetes was cast in the role.
Two well-dressed professional hitmen, Charlie (Marvin) and Lee (MST3K favorite Gulager), are hired to bump off ex-race car driver Johnny North (Cassavetes), who now works as a teacher for a school for the blind. North is given plenty of warning after Charlie and Lee show up, but he does nothing, and allows the two to shoot him to death. Afterwards, Charlie is disturbed by what just happened, in addition to the size of the paycheck, and the rumors that Johnny was involved in a million dollar heist, so he and Lee decide to find North's acquaintances to find out why he didn't try to save his own life, which includes his mechanic and best friend Earl Sylvester (Akins), and his lover Sheila Farr (Dickinson).
Charlie and Lee conclude that North fell in love with Sheila, who talked him into acting as the getaway driver for an armored car heist engineered by her boyfriend Jack Browning (Reagan). North ended up double crossing Browning after the heist went down, so Browning hired Charlie and Lee to take care of him. Johnny's racing career ended after a terrible crash the day that Browning and his men first showed up at the race track. Charlie and Lee believe that they can still profit from the crime North helped commit by finding out that Browning was involved, and discovering the location of the stolen money.
Highly recommended. Everyone was great in this picture, particularly Cassavetes, Gulager and Reagan.
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