The Matador (2005)

If Pierce Brosnan wearing a black Speedo, cowboy boots, and sunglasses and smoking a cigar wasn't in itself worth the price of admission, everything else one gets in this rapturously conceived comedy about a lonely hit man would certainly be enough. But the glorious excesses that writer/director Richard Shepard offers are just part of the considerable range of payoffs that make The Matador a delightful mix of genres that simultaneously spoofs the buddy film, killers, and ordinary American life while it plumbs the complexities of the human heart.

When a traveling salesman, Danny Wright (Greg Kinnear), accidentally meets up with Julian (Brosnan), "a facilitator of fatalities," at a Mexico City bar, their subsequent evening together intertwines their lives in an unexpected, but lasting, bond. Each one is facing what could be a life-changing moment, and though they ostensibly have nothing in common, they're drawn together.

When the twists and turns of fate are revealed, it becomes clear that Shepard has crafted an enormously entertaining work that takes the hit-man film and spins it on its head while creating a funny and strangely poignant story that is original and genuinely moving. With an outrageously unique performance by Brosnan, and great turns by Kinnear and Hope Davis, The Matador is a film that will stay fixed in your memory long after the curtain has closed.— Geoffrey Gilmore (from sundance.org)