Panic

Alex is in his forties, married, with a son. His marriage is not working. He goes to a therapist. He sits in the room and cannot find anything to say. Then he says it: he works in the family business, and the business is contract killing. His father prepared him for it as a child; the first time, he had him shoot a squirrel. Alex wants out. In the waiting room he sees Sarah; she is in her twenties and talkative. He is drawn to her. His father learns of the situation and gives him a new job. The target is the therapist. Henry Bromell writes and directs. William H. Macy plays Alex and Neve Campbell plays Sarah; Tracey Ullman, John Ritter and Donald Sutherland are in the cast. It is an American production. The film screened at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival. Bromell was known as a television writer and this is his first feature as director. The premise is a mixture of kinds; the crime film and family drama are in the same narrative and the humour is dry. The matter it treats is the business inherited from a father; the trade here is an identity and leaving it means leaving the family. The narrative does not show the violence; the killings stay at the edge and the camera does not look at the results. The scenes with Alex's son are its emotional centre; the man is trying not to do the same thing to his child. The father Donald Sutherland plays is its coldest side. Its limit is pace; the narrative is slow, there is little event, and the ending quiet. Who it is for: viewers who like American independent cinema and crime drama. Who it is not for: it is slow, sombre, and the ending bitter.