CONTRACT

Canada, 1999, 90 minutes, Colour.
Johanna Black, Laurent Imbault, Matthew Olver, Billy Dee Williams,
Directed by K. C. Bascombe.

This is a small Canadian film which went straight to video. It focuses on hired assassins, immediately illustrating with an initial hit and the introduction to Luc, an assassin, and Hannah, his associate.

Luc is invited to participate in a killing but declines while Hannah responds online and accepts the job, which leads to a deeper conspiracy, a group of snipers from the Vietnam War and their subsequent careers, having to be eliminated because they know too much about an ambitious senator and his political advancement.

What follows is, more or less, what one might expect from this kind of action thriller.

1. A straight to video violent entertainment? Hired assassins? Political conspiracies?

2. The American city setting, apartments, hotels, political offices, press conferences, the police? The musical score?

3. The initial hit? The introduction to Luc? To Hannah? Their expertise? Back home? The relationship between the two? The Internet contacts for killings? Luc and the Three Little Pigs, his refusal? Hannah and her decision to act? Her going to the hotel, the shootings, the assistant seeing her, informing the hitman, Luc saving her?

4. Hannah and her relationship with James, his being an artist, struggling? The thugs pursuing her, the overthrowing everything in the apartment? In the street, the hold-up by the thugs pretending to be police, the shootings, James and his saving and by shooting? His bewilderment?

5. Luc, on the job, his being killed?

6. The Senator, press conferences, saving America? The background in Vietnam, the Special Ops, the snipers and assassins, the Senator’s political ambitions, needing to get rid of all the snipers?

7. Hannah, going to see her old friend, his support, with James? Her story? His information, the photo of the Vietnam veterans, the identities?

8. Hannah tracking down Bob, his warning Luc, not knowing about his death, his going with Hannah, to confront the Senator and his thugs?

9. The Senator, his assistants, GPS, locating the car, confronting Hannah, the explanations? Shooting her friend? The gun on James? Hannah using her wits? The fights?

10. The Senator, his escape, going to his car? The detonation?

11. Hannah and her future? James? His going into writing graphic novels and comics?

12. The background of the film, conspiracies, political ambitions, Vietnam veterans, their being used, hit men – and the moral/amoral aspects of the film?