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How Anti-‘Algorithm’ Richard Linklater’s Hit Man Ended Up at Netflix
The Glen Powell–starring festival smash seemed destined for a big theatrical release. A rainmaking sales agent walks us through what happened.
That is to say: Unlike so many minutely observed, independently financed, take-your-medicine-style dramas that force contemplation of uncomfortable yet socially redemptive subjects at Venice and the Toronto International Film Festival (where the movie made North American landfall on September 11), Hit Man pulses with mass appeal; it has been anointed by cultural first responders as an unapologetically entertaining, outrightly commercial offering with the strong potential to put butts in theater seats. Never mind that Linklater himself has publicly groused about the “suddenly it’s there … so what?” rollout for his last movie on Netflix, the animated coming-of-age drama Apollo 10 ½: A Space Age Childhood, which premiered to warm reviews at SXSW last year. John Sloss, CEO of the management and advisory firm Cinetic Media, is arguably indie filmdom’s foremost deal-maker, a Sundance stalwart who has set up financing and distribution arrangements for Linklater since his 1990 directorial debut, Slacker.
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