Jack is a man on the run.  Some people want him dead and he decides to lay low in a small remote Italian village, Caste del Monte.   He is a man with many secrets and decides to take on a final job to build a weapon for a woman assassin.  .   Jack (Clooney) is a weary man who can’t trust anyone and yet that change when he befriends a local priest in a small Italian village and falls for a beautiful prostitute, Carla.

THE AMERICAN is very introspective as it uses very few warriors to tell a story of an assassin/gun maker who seeks redemption only to find it isn’t that easy.   Director Anton Corbijn says he structured the film like a Western and that it is a morality tale.   George Clooney delivers a powerful portrayal of a man who wants to find people he can be close to and not be so closed off due to the sins of his past.  THE AMERICAN is a very visual picture delivered by a photographer and the visual storytelling is very important to this morality tale.   Sometime you can’t escape your past no matter how hard you try.  Jack wants to escape it and build a new life where as his secret past has left him lonely and paranoid.  The small town is like a maze he tries to hide in and navigate to escape his past.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

Five deleted scenes are included which would have slowed down the pacing of the film.

JOURNEY TO REDEMPTION: THE MAKING FO THE AMERICAN is basic promotional fluff

The feature Audio Commentary is with Director Anton Corbijn.

FINAL ANALYSIS:  THE AMERICAN is an absorbing introspective drama that could have easily been a Western.   Don’t miss it, see it.

This DVD review is ©1-9-2011 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission.  Send all comments to lord_pragmagtic@hotmail.com