Available on Netflix, “The Killer” is the new film by David Fincher. Did you know that the filmmaker adapted a famous French comic strip for his thriller?
Finally available on Netflix, The Killer is one of the films by great directors that was most anticipated on the platform. This new thriller in six chapters from David Fincher, who signed an exclusive contract with the platform, plunges us into the psyche of a hitman who fights against his employers and himself, in a punitive mission through the world that is supposedly nothing personal, after a narrowly avoided disaster.
The Killer allows the filmmaker to return to his first loves and above all to see one of his long-standing projects transposed to the screen. Indeed, David Fincher developed the adaptation of a successful French comic strip, which he had read when its English version was published in 2007.
To do this, he found screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker, who had signed the script for Seven but also participated in the writing (uncredited) of The Game and Fight Club, so that he could work on writing the script for The Killer from this popular comic.
Which French comic did David Fincher adapt?
This comic is called The killer and its first volume was released in 1998! Twenty-five years later, the comic book series has 13 albums and is still not finished to this day. We owe this detective comic series, published by Casterman in the Ligne rouge collection, to the French Alexis Nolent (Matz), for the screenplay, and Luc Jacamon, for the illustration.
The comics tell the story of the character of the Killer, a hitman who coldly executes his contracts. Dialogues are almost absent from these works, we mainly follow the interior monologue of the character of the Killer through his memories, his questions and his states of mind.
“He told me he loved this comic, what it said, the way the story unfolded, everything”, explained Alexis Nolent in the press kit for the film. The author, who infused this dark humor and this impertinent tone into his work, has not forgotten the enthusiasm of David Fincher in the years following his reading of the comic strip.
Netflix
However, it was not until the arrival of Andrew Kevin Walker on board that the adaptation project finally got on track. The screenwriter and director have close ties following their various collaborations and have kept in touch.
Working together again on The Killer was a natural fit, as David Fincher explains: “With Andy, we talked a lot about intercepting thoughts. How sincere is this introspection?”
Indeed, the film adaptation takes up this mechanism of inner thoughts with the voice-over which punctuates this story of revenge carried by Michael Fassbender. The plot is thus tighter than that of the comics, which is richer in twists and turns and political context.
It is this immersion in the thoughts of the Killer which fascinated David Fincher, convinced to adapt the comic strip: “I love the idea of a murderer’s code. But from a narrative point of view, what took us to the next level was the fact that we were precisely at the heart of subjectivity. We are in this guy’s head.”
David Fincher’s The Killer is available on Netflix.