The new thriller The Killer has been available on Netflix since last week. In it, Michael Fassbender becomes the target of retaliation after a mistaken assassination attempt.
Director David Fincher worked on the film adaptation of the material 15 years ago. At that time, however, with another main actor in mind. It could have been the perfect reunion after Seven and Fight Club.
Brad Pitt was Fincher’s first candidate for The Killer
So let’s travel back to the distant years of 2007 and 2008. Michael Fassbender was about to celebrate his breakthrough back then, he could be seen in 300 and starred in Hunger. Inglourious Basterds and X-Men: The first decision was still in the future. Instead, Fincher had a reunion with his Seven and Fight Club star Brad Pitt in mind. The director revealed this in an interview with Rolling Stone:
I originally thought of Brad Pitt in 2008. But his reaction was: ‘Hmm, a little too nihilistic for me.’
Pitt apparently lacked any bright spots in the material of a cold killer on a quest for revenge, which is surprising given his Fincher films from the 90s. On the other hand, even Seven features the relationship between Pitt’s cop and his on-screen wife Gwyneth Paltrow, while Fight Club… well, you probably need a little more imagination to find bright spots.
Sony
Brad Pitt in Bullet Train
Let’s stick with this: Ten years after those ’90s hits, the nihilism of The Killer wasn’t to Pitt’s taste. The perfect thriller reunion with David Fincher failed to materialize. Instead, he made a film with Fincher full of bright spots that goes in a different direction than the common 90s cult films: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
This is how Michael Fassbender got the lead role in the Netflix film
The killer fell asleep over it. It wasn’t until over a decade later that the adaptation of the graphic novel series by Alexis Nolent and Luc Jacamon was revived. But now the star was missing. Fincher on this: “Then, about a dozen years later, […] I thought of Michael Fassbender.”
Netflix
Michael Fassbender in The Killer
After X-Men: Dark Phoenix (2019), Fassbender made himself rare in the film business. For some time now he has been investing more time in his hobby: racing. He has even competed in the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans for the past two years.
That probably worked to his advantage on The Killer, as Fincher explains. Both the physical challenge and the precision in portraying the perfectionist would have benefited from the racing experience: “He could tell the audience everything they needed to know just by doing exactly what he did, efficient, precise and without a single word.”
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There wasn’t the perfect Seven and Fight Club reunion with Brad Pitt, but there was another one. Because Fincher worked with Andrew Kevin Walker on the adaptation of the Netflix film. The author celebrated his breakthrough in 1995 – when he was seven. He later helped revise another Fincher screenplay: Fight Club.
Meanwhile, Brad Pitt played his own killer with a fisherman’s hat or bucket hat, namely in Bullet Train. Everyone can decide for themselves how nihilistic it is.