I can't list this movie as one of my favorite movies but it does have two of my favorite actors reminding me why they are. I have always loved Pierce Brosnan as far back as Remington Steel. I feel he was robbed of the James Bond gig in his prime but was still glad when he finally was cast as 007. I have found Greg Kinnear to be a most versatile actor. He really has a true range. If he was a singer he would be Mariah Carey in her heyday.I did not find this move to be action packed but what it lacked in action it made up for in content. I truly enjoyed the friendship these men had. I also can understand the way their friendship developed and feel that in the given circumstances anyone could end up following the same sequence of events.I did not like this movie enough to watch it again alone but I would watch it with someone else so that they could experience both the interesting story line and two great actors working together to offer a quality product.

The Matador is a low budget film but makes good use of location filming to give the impression that its punching above its weight.It also has a cult following and a good soundtrack with a killer end track.Pierce Brosnan continues his anti-Bond roles with a slimy, smarmy, sleazy hit-man having a crisis. When the time for a hit comes he gets the yips and unable to pull a trigger, causing his handlers consternation..Brosnan meets in a hotel bar in Mexico, Greg Kinnear an out of sorts businessman still grieving the loss of his son and feeling the pinch that he is not landing the big clients and his business may go down the tubes.Out in a bull fight arena Brosnan reveals his true vocation and the art of the Matador mirrors that to the art of the Hit-man. However with Brosnan's continuing lack of hits means that he needs Kinnear's help, the two people are unlikely allies but they both kind of need each to get over some obstacles that life has thrown at them.This is an enjoyable film, maybe it takes time to get going but it has dark edgy comedy mixed with bittersweet drama.

This is a strange one, which curiously does not really concern matadors either. Pierce Brosnan is brilliant at playing a professional hit man who is going to pieces psychologically because he is burnt-out and can no longer carry out his murder assignments. I do not really approve of films in which hit men are portrayed as socially acceptable, and like the proverbial 'prostitute with the heart of gold', are really nice and admirable people if we can just understand them and try not to be prejudiced against them. We live in an age of moral relativism at best, or should I say moral nihilism. And it is an interesting sociological question to ask why it is that so many films are made about hit men. What is it about professional killers that makes us want to devote film after film to them? Are there no more pleasant characters we could consider instead? Is it really funny when hit men are involved in comic situations? Ha ha ha. He couldn't pull the trigger, silly fellow, so let's give him a drink and try and cheer him up. And let's all have a laugh at his inability to carry out an assassination. Now, seriously, is this what we should be watching? The 'buddy' of the killer is played by Greg Kinnear, whose role as Jack Kennedy in the mini-series THE KENNEDYS (2011, see my review), I have already described previously as a brilliant portrayal. He is a fine actor who does an excellent job of being a 'normal guy' and, hence, a bit of a simpleton when compared to the much cleverer Brosnan, who has the good sense to be a professional assassin (the implication being that if Kinnear weren't such a fool, he would be out there killing people too). When asked to help kill someone, Kinnear at first refuses, but then enthusiastically joins in. His resistance is pretty feeble, and the moral to viewers seems to be: come on, folks, why not join in the fun? Let's all kill people for money, it's great. Pardon my dissenting voice in this matter. Although the film is witty, funny, and amusing, it is also morally deeply disturbing and should not have been made. It merely adds one more drop to the drip-drip-drip of what remains of the moral fabric of our civilisation going down the drain. But hey, let's live for the moment, oil our guns, and enjoy killing people while we can. Yes, this is a highly civilised film, a film about a civilisation which is in such a state of terminal decadence that even plenty of laughter cannot save it.

This film is a real stinker. In every department the lack of expertise is unmissable. From the meandering script to the static and dreary camera-work, the slack editing, and even the hideous typeface chosen for the tiles telling us which country we are now in, it is clear that this is a film made in a rush and on the cheap. As Producer, Pierce Brosnan's motives are clear – he wants a chance to give us an 'edgy' self deprecating performance to prove he can. Director and writer Richard Shephard admits on the DVD extras that this was his chance to work on something substantial, and my guess is that the attraction was that he had the script and was probably prepared to do it for a very reasonable rate. The problem is that the movie rambles from one dreary conversation to the next, interspersed with some gratuitous sex scenes, aimed, I imagine, at proving to the audience that Brosnan still has it, (if indeed he ever had it, his Bond films being distinguished by their lack of charisma).The art direction is clumsy – note the scene where Brosnan in a very unlikeable yellow brown jacket is set amongst a lot of sunshades of a similar unlikeable yellowy brown. The lighting cameraman does a professional job, but the film he shot has been hacked rather than edited with gimmicky and flashy tricks that come from pop promos and which were out of date minutes after they were invented. Huge close ups suddenly interrupt interminable scenes shot in dreary mid-shot recording performances that seem to have been largely untouched by advice from a director.Believe it or not , seventeen (seventeen!!) producers were thought necessary to get this turkey made, supervising a team listed as over 330 strong(!), not including cast, for a film that feels like a two man conversation for large stretches. If Pierce is wondering where the money went, the answer is – not on the screen. Contrast and compare with "The African Queen" – 2 producers and a credited crew of 41, shooting a film in the wild, again mostly made up of conversations between two people. Which is better value for money? Which film would you rather see? I know what I think.