Obscurity beckons for this pitifully plotted ensemble piece about an assassins’ support group
There was a stretch of time recently when violent, talky crime stories flourished in the
British film scene like mushrooms in a woodland glade. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Sexy Beast and Bronson are some of the more successful exercises in the genre. But then there’s a lot of inedible fungus in there too, several of them featuring now eminent talents such as Ray Winstone (44 Inch Chest), Jude Law (Breaking and Entering), or both (Love, Honour and Obey).
Before he was canonised as one of Britain’s finest thespians, Gary Oldman made several contributions to this mycological mulch. With Killers Anonymous he returns to these soggy roots, contributing a turn as an assassin’s agent who runs a 12-step programme in
Los Angeles for people who kill repeatedly. It’s a nonsensical premise and a pretty incoherent, painfully inept film. Despite being prominently featured in the credits, Oldman is quite peripheral to the action after the opening two scenes and he ends up spending much of his screen time sitting alone on a roof watching the action from afar.