The Killer Elite
United Artists | Release Date: December 19, 1975 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
57
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 9 Critic Reviews
Positive:
4
Mixed:
5
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
63
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Sam Peckinpah's The Killer Elite is directed and acted with a certain nice style, but it puts us through so many convolutions of the plot that finally we just don't care. Read full review
50
The New York TimesRichard Eder
Mr. Peckinpah is mannered and inventive, and these qualities both give the film its strengths and undermine it horrendously. Cleverness, for one thing, gets in the way of comprehensibility. Read full review
70
Time OutStaff (Not Credited)
Unmistakable Peckinpah - not a masterpiece, but enough to be going on with. Read full review
50
TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)
Lesser Peckinpah, but fascinating nonetheless. Read full review
63
Chicago ReaderDave Kehr
Half self-parody, half deadly serious, The Killer Elite is an intriguingly enigmatic movie from one of our most committed and most maligned film artists. Read full review
50
VarietyStaff (Not Credited)
The Killer Elite is an okay Sam Peckinpah actioner starring James Caan and Robert Duvall as two modern mercenaries who wind up stalking each other in a boringly complex double-cross plot [from the novel by Robert Rostand]. Read full review
50
Portland OregonianMarc Mohan
The Killer Elite is possibly Bloody Sam's worst film, and the martial-arts-themed actioner is must-see material only for the director's completists, despite a cast that includes James Caan and Robert Duvall. [17 Jun 2005, p.43]
60
EmpireIan Nathan
Peckinpah is never quite as comfortable with the high-rise terrain (including sloppy kung fu) as he is with the dusty rawhide of the West, but it still shows up the slick trigger-edits of new action cinema for the gutless vacuum it has become. Read full review
70
The New YorkerPauline Kael
Peckinpah's poetic, corkscrew vision of the modern world, claustrophobically exciting.
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