What’s up, Reel Leaders? Welcome back to another edition of Reel Leadership. This is the time of the week when we look at a great movie and the leadership lessons it contains.
This week, our movie is The Killer’s Game. It’s a thrill ride that’s a lot of fun, especially if you like action movies.
Starring former wrestler Dave Bautista as hitman Joe Flood, it’s a story of misinformation and then revenge. Joe received a terminal diagnosis. He has Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD). This disease will slowly eat away at his motor skills until he dies.
Joe puts a hit out on himself to make things easier on himself and his newfound love, Maize (Sofia Boutella). This way, he won’t rot away and die a painful death. He can ensure his death is quick.
Except…
Plot twist: Joe was misdiagnosed. He didn’t have CJD. His illness was a mystery to the doctor, but he would live.
Except…
The woman he hired to put out the hit, Antoinette (Pom Klementieff), has revenge on her mind. She has desired Joe’s death ever since he killed her father. Joe even reached out to Antoinette to ask her to pull the hit. She wouldn’t.
And then the action ensues. So do the leadership lessons.
Quotes And Leadership Lessons From The Killer’s Game
1. Joe Flood:
That’s not how the game works.
Joe Flood was a hired hitman. He would take jobs to rid the world of some of the most despicable bad guys around. The first kill we see Joe do is Ivan.
Ivan is attending the opera-ballet alongside his date. Joe kills his way past the guards. That’s when he comes face to face with Ivan. And a request.
It’s the middle of the opera. There’s a stirring dance happening. Ivan asks Joe to pause for 10 more seconds. Joe tells him he can’t. It’s against the rules.
Do you know the rules of leadership? Do you know the way leadership works?
Great leaders study leadership. They know the ins and outs of how leading works.
Study, learn, understand leadership.
2. Joe Flood:
Define hit.
Joe had gone to see Doctor Kagan (Raffaello Degruttola) because of his increased headaches and blurred vision. He was fearful for his life.
The doctor began to ask him questions. One of those was how many hits he’d taken to the head.
Joe responds with a double-meaning question. He asks the good doctor to define hit (since he’s a hitman).
Your people need you to define what you’re asking of and speaking to them. Your words can have multiple meanings.
Clarifying what you mean will go a long way toward understanding.
3. Joe Flood:
Sometimes I ask myself why I do this.
Before going to Antoinette to hire out the hit on himself, he approaches his father-like figure, Zvi Rabinowitz (Ben Kingsley), to discuss his headaches and pain. He also shares how he almost had a mishap at the opera and found a beautiful woman, Maize, that he would like to care for in the future.
The conversation meandered, but the key thing Joe mentioned was that he wasn’t sure why he was doing what he was doing.
Have you ever asked yourself that question? Do you know why you’re leading?
We can make things a lot easier on ourselves by answering that question. Figure out why you’re leading. Then, if it’s not still for you, get out.
4. Leaders have to shoot their shot:
After Joe took out the bad guy at the opera house, he rescued Maize from being trampled by the patrons who were rushing from the opera house. She had been stepped on and kicked on. Joe stepped in, grabbed her phone, and picked her up. He ushered her out of the building.
But he forgot to give her back her phone.
He eventually gets up the guts to bring the phone to her. When he does, Maize shoots her shot. She asks him out to dinner.
Joe was reluctant at first. He even throws away her phone number! Only to go back, search through the trash, and give her a call.
Maize shot her shot. She got what she wanted.
For many of us, making a big ask can be daunting, overwhelming, anxiety-ridden. Don’t let those emotions hold you back.
Instead, be confident, make the ask, shoot your shot. You won’t advance if you’re not taking big risks. Go big!
5. We see what we want to see:
After Doctor Kagan gives Joe his terminal diagnosis, Joe goes home to search the internet. He looks up everything he can find about Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
As he’s reviewing the symptoms, he begins to see the symptoms in himself. His vision blurs. The headaches increase. His hands start to shake!
He’s got it. He’s going to die. Or so he tells himself.
Many of the symptoms Joe saw were self-induced. He saw what he thought he should.
We can hear bad news and our minds begin to run wild with the coming trouble. We begin to see danger where there is no danger. Often, we bring more chaos to our lives than need be.
Don’t let your mind run wild with negative thoughts. Contain them. Take your thought life under control.
Otherwise, you’re going to see death all around you.
6. We can’t see the issues clearly but others often can:
One of the gangs Antoinette had hired to kill Joe was the Goyang gang. The gang was led by Goyang (Lee Hoon).
As Goyang walked into Joe’s apartment, he wondered out loud about the darkness of the apartment. The room was dimly lit. Or so it appeared.
A gang member spoke up. The apartment was dark because Goyang had his sunglasses on.
Whoops!
This happens to leaders all of the time. They can’t see or understand the issue because something obscures their vision.
What’s obscuring your vision? What can you do to remove the issue?
Or maybe you need to ask yourself who in your life can speak to those blind spots? Who sees what you’re not seeing?
Others can often see more clearly than you can.
7. It’s okay to say no:
Antoinette sends out the hit on Joe to one of her trusted assassins, Lovedahl (Terry Crews). He receives the hit on a Tinder-like app on his cell phone.
When he gets it, he reviews the details, considers the pay, and decides. He swipes left. He denied the hit. It was a big no for him, dawg.
We don’t have to say yes to every opportunity that presents itself to us. Saying no is a valid answer.
Don’t be pressured into saying yes because others are. Know what your values and worth are.
8. Solutions can come at unexpected times:
Joe went to visit Zvi and his wife. At their home, Zvi’s wife began to give Joe a massage.
Zvi’s wife begins to whip Joe’s neck back and forth. There’s a loud crack. Zvi thought she’d paralyzed Joe.
No… Not at all. In fact, the massage and neck cracking cured Joe. His headache and blurred vision went away.
We think we need to know our issues’ where, when, why, and how. If we don’t, we won’t get an answer. Right?
Wrong.
Many times, solutions to our problems will come unexpectedly. It could be on your daily run. Or in the shower. Or maybe at your kid’s baseball game.
Be ready for solutions to present themselves. They’ll come when you least expect them.
9. Lovedahl:
Tell me what you see.
Lovedahl eventually accepted the hit on Joe when Antoinette increased the fee. One problem, though, is she sent her relative Flavio (Joe Kovalik Jr.) to chauffer him around. Then she made a request…
Help young Flavio into the Killer’s Game. She wanted him to become a hitman.
Flavio is great comic relief. He’s not a great hitman wannabe.
Flavio and Lovedahl pull into the castle grounds Joe has chosen for his final showdown. As Flavio is driving, Lovedahl asks him what he sees. His answer? A big old castle.
Lovedahl saw something else. A trap set up by Joe.
Help young talent see what’s really in front of them. Many team members will see the obvious. It’s the unseen, less obvious that’s important.
You can show them the ropes. You can help them understand how to see what’s there.
10. Priest:
Make time.
Joe brings Maize to a church after a bullet strikes her. While there, the two decide they want to get married. Their luck, a priest is in the church.
They discuss a bit about marriage and what it would take. The priest then tells them they need to make confession.
Joe says they don’t have time (he knows how much he has to confess to). The priest pushes back. He tells Joe he needs to make time.
I want to encourage you to make time for your faith. It’s an important aspect of who you are and there’s a loving God out there who desires for you to have a relationship with him.
Make time for your faith.
