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That is a scene filled with tension and seething distaste from both characters, as well as a sense of foreboding. Can you imagine how boring the scene would be if a narrator told us this as opposed to us watching it unfold? I’m not sure what Kubrick was thinking here — I know, big surprise — but having an unseen narrator is the major issue with this film. I also think that, while the film is so short and precisely timed, the heist genre makes it so difficult to tie yourself to one character. We may not sympathize with the crooks, but because Kubrick’s jumping between Johnny and George before the heist goes down, and because the heist takes up the final 35 minutes of the film, there’s no one to stick with.

Kubrick is well-known for his cold, distant sensibility and his eye for striking imagery. Arguably, his best visual work is thanks to color (though Paths of Glory is as arresting as 2001, in its own way), so The Killing doesn’t feature as much impressive work due to it being in black-and-white. That said, an early scene where Johnny lays out the plan to his cohorts makes solid use of the darkness of a room. While it may seem a bit too noirish for some viewers, the shrouds of black that permeate this scene are almost breathtaking to behold. Frankly, the truly impressive aspect of the filmmaking here is the editing. The heist features a storytelling technique that, these days, isn’t too revolutionary. Back in the 1950s, though, I wonder how groundbreaking it was. We see the heist from each person’s point of view, essentially jumping back and forth between the beginning of the heist and the end of it.

As you know if you’ve read this column long enough, I love film noir. I’m not sure that I love each film from Stanley Kubrick, but his visual stamp is impressive enough that I’ve even been able to accept that 2001 is an imagistic masterpiece. I will probably never get behind the film being as much of a masterpiece as it’s pegged by most critics, but there’s no question that its influence is as evident today as it was 40 years ago. Watching The Killing reminded me of watching the first films from directors like Christopher Nolan or Paul Thomas Anderson, Following and Hard Eight, respectively. All three films show promise and glimmers of talent (and Nolan didn’t have any name actors to work with, which is all the more impressive), but you leave each film with potential that hasn’t been met yet. The Killing is a good movie, but it’s not so much a Stanley Kubrick film, as much as a movie he happened to direct when he was young.

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