Yes, we are all fooled by the films of 'hitman'

Before Hit Man was released, I had never thought Richard Linklater would make a movie about a hitman. After watching it, I realized that Linklater could not only tell a story about a hitman, but also do it with brevity and imagination.

The movie tells the story of a college philosophy professor who also works as an undercover cop in a casual and humorous way. It's rare that there are no action scenes in such a story about a hitman, where there are countless premeditated murder cases. Gary (played by Glen Powell), after receiving some training, uses his profession as a university philosophy and psychology teacher to analyze human psychology and play his own costume-changing game, much like cosplay.

My impression of Glen Powell's acting is still stuck on his performance in Anyone But You. To be honest, he is not the 'eye candy' type in my eyes, and his acting skills are mediocre. But he is a person with contrasting qualities. Sometimes he looks clumsy, like a boring high school teacher. But once he does something out of the ordinary and breaks people's inherent impression of him as "clumsy", he suddenly has a kind of sexiness. Perhaps this’s why Richard Linklater chose him to play the role of Gary.

Gary's appearance in the university at first is like the typical boring professor. With a dull hairstyle and always wearing a nerdy plaid shirt, he is neither the most popular person in school nor someone weird enough to become an oddball. He seems nothing more than an everyman until he starts working with the police and becomes an undercover agent.

Speaking of undercover, the characters in various action blockbusters come to mind: such as those in Infernal Affairs, The Bourne Identity, Berlin Station, etc. I believe I’m not the only one who has a favorite hitman in heart , whether it's James Bond in the 007 series or Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible or anyone else. The undercover agents in these films usually have extraordinary physical skills, superior wisdom, and the ability to retreat in extremely dangerous environments, living a life full of thrilling moments. After watching a lot of such movies, I tend to feel that there is a side of the world that I don't understand —a world where the undercover agents live.

I felt this feeling most strongly when I was living in London. At that time, I lived in an apartment on the south bank of Zone 1, opposite to the UK's MI5 and MI6. During the two years I was there, I would look at those two buildings every time I passed by. I saw some sports cars coming in and out, and I fantasized that those sports cars might belong to agents like 007. They might have just completed a mission, or maybe just saved the world (or destroyed an organization).

However, all this is just fantasy.

Nothing special ever happened in this neighborhood, and it's even much more boring than the Soho area a few kilometers away. If I want to watch an exciting story, the best choice would never be to stay at the door of MI6, but to go to the West End of London, where there are countless cinemas and theaters. There, the world presents a more fantastic side.

Looking back now, my obsession with MI5 is similar to the mentality of every hitman movie lover. We are unwilling to believe that the real world is as we have experienced it - ordinary, boring, fleeting, and sometimes meaningless. We would rather believe life in the world elsewhere is more exciting: there are villains who are utterly wicked, skilled hitmen, and heroes who are tragic and romantic.

This mentality is undoubtedly shaped by the movie world, and the works created by movie creators based on people's common mentality in turn affect people's worldview. Therefore, the plot depicted in Hit Man, while seemingly absurd, is actually very realistic and reasonable. Gary, after analyzing the psychology of every person who buys a hitman to kill, dresses himself as the Hitman they imagine in their minds. Almost each one can be found in similar roles in hitman-type films. Then, Gary meets with them, draws out their words about wanting to hire a hitman to kill, gets the down payment, and the mission is completed. This is very much like entrapment, but without any chases nor fights, and it works every time.

Gary's disguises are a mockery of both the layman's unrealistic fantasies about hitmen of all kinds and also the spectacle of action movies represented by the image of the 'hitman'. Every time he contacts a client, I feel like I'm watching a terrible stage play. This affected feeling is perhaps what Linklater wants to convey. For Gary, every mission is a performance. Since it's all an act, why not choose to play a sexy hitman instead of a boring teacher?

In the 1950s, American sociologist Erving Goffman proposed a very famous dramaturgical theory. It compares people's daily lives to a stage, where people play different roles and display different self-images according to different occasions and audiences. This theory believes that people constantly manage their impressions in social interactions, trying to control others' perceptions of themselves.

In this theory, the society is also like a big stage. When we interact with others, it's like coming to the front of the stage, and we begin to perform a "personality". But it's worth noting that a person will unconsciously play a role even backstage. Because we will create an imaginary audience who will be watching us even when we are alone. Think about it, when you are by yourself, do you have some expectations and constraints on your behavior? As long as we live in a group, we will internalize other people's views to some extent.

For me, the inspiration brought by dramaturgical theory is not about revealing that humans are vain beings who love to perform and disguise themselves, but to point out a characteristic inherent in human psychology: that is, to understand others and society as a theater through imagination, and in turn to design their own behavior based on the roles they see themselves in. In the movie, Gary explains Freud's superego theory to his students. He finally chooses a cooler, sexier "self-role" Ron, and uses the identity of Ron to meet the heroine and develop the subsequent story. He can play the sexy Ron, which means he can become the sexy Ron. In the later part of the story, he has incorporated the role of Hitman Ron into his daily life. The students in the school all find him sexier, and his girlfriend also accepts the part of his personality that becomes more like Ron.

In the end, after helping Madison cover up her crime, Gary, who has never shot and killed anyone, becomes the real Ron: a man who wanders on the edge of crime, dangerous and sexy. You can choose who you want to become, just like Gary. You can also choose how you imagine this world, just like Madison.

Of course, the subtitles at the end tell us that the real Gary has never killed anyone. He has participated in countless undercover activities in his life, but he is only playing "hitman", not becoming a real Hitman.

Perhaps a world where professional hitmen are everywhere sounds wilder and more exciting, but it must also be more dangerous. As ordinary people, boredom may be a drawback, but it also means safety. Let all the fantasies that the movie world gives us remain as they are.