Hitman

Hitman
This article is about the criminal occupation. For other uses, see Hitman (disambiguation).

A hitman is a person hired to kill another person.


Contents

Hitmen in organized crime

Hitmen are largely linked to the world of organized crime. Hitmen are hired people[citation needed] who kill people for money. Notable examples include Murder, Inc., Mafia hitmen and Richard Kuklinski.

Other cases involving hitmen

These are non-mafia killings, or attempted killings, that involved a hitman. In some of these cases the "hitman" was not necessarily a "professional" hitman, but a paid amateur.

Hitmen

Notable victims of hitmen

  • Li Fuguo a Tang Dynasty Eunuch killed by a hitman hired by Emperor Tang Daizong
  • Shiori Ino was a 21-year-old University student killed by hitman Yoshifumi Kubota, who served 18 years in prison for the killing. He was paid by her ex-boyfriend and his brother; the case gained some notoriety in Japan.
  • Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a Hamas official was killed on January 20, 2010, with the killers being suspected Israeli Mossad agents.[1] The hitmen have Interpol warrants for their arrest.[2]
  • Grady Stiles, freak show performer whose family hired a hitman to kill him because of his abusiveness
  • Ji Yunqing, a Chinese Shanghai Triad boss affiliated with Wang Jingwei's Puppet Regime in the late 1930s murdered by BIS hitman Zhan Seng.

Notable cases of hiring a hitman

Hitmen in fiction

Anime

  • In the anime Darker than Black, the main character often performs contract killings for various organizations.
  • In the anime and manga Dragon Ball, a mercenary named Tao Pai Pai is hired by the Red Ribbon Army to kill Goku.
  • In the anime Gungrave, the main character is a hitman for the Mafia.
  • The anime Reborn! contains several hitmen and women. Tsuna Sawada (the main character), along with his school friends, are trained by a hitman to succeed the previous Vongola Family.

Comics and cartoons

Film

Hitmen have, at times, been a notable part of crime films.

  • A rise in such characters began in 1970s due to "mafia films" like The Godfather.
  • Charles Bronson plays a hitman in the 1972 film The Mechanic.
  • Henry Silva plays a hitman in the 1981 film Sharky's Machine.
  • Lee Marvin plays a hitman in the 1964 film The Killers.
  • A notable example from the 1980s is the final scene of Scarface, in which an hit-men squad is sent to kill the protagonist, Tony Montana.
  • One of the two central storylines in the 1989 film Crimes and Misdemeanors is about the moral dilemma of a successful ophthalmologist who hires a hitman to kill his mistress because she is threatening to expose his double life.
  • In the early 1990s, Jean Reno gained some attention as a hitman in Léon: The Professional.

The James Bond film, The Man with the Golden Gun, features Francisco Scaramanga. Scaramanga is a high-priced hit man, supposedly the best in the world, charging one million dollars per kill. He's best known for being "The man with the golden gun", because he only uses bullets made of gold in a fictitious, 4.2 mm cartridge. All of Scaramanga's dealings go through his henchman Nick Nack, which allows Scaramanga to be anonymous.

In the mid-1990s to the 2000s, several "offbeat" portrayals of hitmen arose.

In the 2005 black comedy The Matador, Pierce Brosnan portrays the fictional hitman Julian Noble, an experienced hitman who suffers a mental breakdown, causing him to freeze during the last seconds of the job.

A few portrayals of hitmen have earned nominations or awards.

In other countries the vision of the hitman is often one of tragic, individual with a solitary existence.

  • In the 1967 French film, Le Samouraï, Jef Costello is an example of this.
  • Furthermore, the film Ghost Dog takes inspiration from it.
  • In the aforementioned Léon: The Professional his existence outside of hits revolves around his houseplant and watching old films.
  • In the 1989 film, The Killer, the main character, Ah Jong, attempts to perform one last hit as a means of setting right an injustice that he had previously caused.

Video games

  • The main character of the video game series Hitman was genetically engineered by a man called Dr. Ort-Meyer in an insane asylum in Romania. He is known only as Agent 47. 47 is highly regarded in the criminal underworld, so much so that many consider him to be a myth. The gameplay revolves around infiltrating an area, executing a target (or targets) and escaping without apprehension. Although it isn't compulsory, the Hitman games encourage the player to use stealth and cunning maneuvers to eliminate targets, as opposed to making use of pure firepower. A film adaption which deviated widely from its source material was released in 2007. It was confirmed that a fifth game would be in production.
  • In some videogames, such as the Grand Theft Auto series, the main character is given tasks akin to acting as a Hitman. This is most obviously shown in Grand Theft Auto IV with Niko Bellic, who is frequently hired as a hitman in the game.

See also

References

  1. ^ Hamas death: Dubai says four more forged passports used by the Christian Science Monitor, looked up on March 18, 2010
  2. ^ ALIAS BARNEY, Alias Michael Lawrence by Interpol, looked up on March 18, 2010

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Look at other dictionaries:

  • Hitman — (v. engl. hit, to hit „Treffen“ und man „Mann“ „Person“) bezeichnet einen Auftragsmörder, Hitman (Computerspiel), eine Computerspiel Serie, die von einem im Genlabor erschaffenen Auftragskiller handelt, Hitman – Jeder stirbt alleine, den Film… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • hitman — “hired assassin,” 1970, from HIT (Cf. hit) in the underworld sense + MAN (Cf. man) …   Etymology dictionary

  • Hitman — рекламная иллюстрация к Hitman из Hitman: Blood Money Hitman популярная компьютерная игра в жанре стелс экшена, доступная на многих современных платформах. Действие игр развивается вокруг профессионального лысого клона киллера, известного, как… …   Википедия

  • Hitman 2 — Der Strichcode von Hitman Filmdarsteller Timothy Olyphant Hitman ist eine Computerspiel Serie und handelt von einem im Genlabor erschaffenen Auftragsk …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Hitman — Para la película basada en este videojuego, véase Hitman (película). Hitman es una serie de videojuegos disponible en la mayoría de los formatos modernos. La trama de los videojuegos gira en torno a un hombre llamado Agente 47 (a menudo… …   Wikipedia Español

  • Hitman — Cette page d’homonymie répertorie les différents sujets et articles partageant un même nom. Hitman est un terme anglais signifiant tueur à gages. Hitman est une série de jeux vidéo. Hitman est le nom de plusieurs films : 1981 : Hit Man… …   Wikipédia en Français

  • hitman — [[t]hɪ̱tmæn[/t]] hitmen also hit man N COUNT A hitman is a man who is hired by someone in order to kill another person …   English dictionary

  • Hitman: Absolution — Разработчик IO Interactive Издатель Square Enix Локализатор Новый Диск …   Википедия

  • Hitman 2: Silent Assassin — Разработчик IO Interactive Издатель Eidos Interactive …   Википедия

  • Hitman (серия) — Рекламная иллюстрация к Hitman: Blood Money Hitman (русск. «киллер»)  популярная серия компьютерных игр в жанре стелс экшена, доступная на многих современных платформах. Действие игр развивается вокруг профессионального лысого клона киллера …   Википедия

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