Hit Man has topped Netflix’s most watched chart just days after landing on the streaming service (Picture: AP)
Hit Man has topped Netflix’s most-watched films list, receiving a whopping 10.8 million views in its first two days on the platform – which amounts to a massive 20.8 million hours of viewing time.
Originally receiving its official debut in September 2023 at the Venice Film Festival, where it stunned critics, Hit Man eventually arrived on Netflix on Friday 7 June 2024.
Big things were hoped for this new crime comedy-noir. And, pleasingly for everyone involved, big things are happening. With an impressive critics’ rating of 97% on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes, it’s clear that those that are paid to know and write about films are fans of this new flick.
Viewers are also into it, with Hit Man currently holding an audience rating of 93% on that same website.
So, it’s no surprise that Hit Man leapt to the top of Netflix’s most-watched list just two days after it’s release.
Top Gun: Maverick’s Glen Powell is at his charismatic best as college professor Gary Johnson, who moonlights as a fake hitman for the New Orleans Police Department. His job is to help snare folk trying to hire assassins to off people.
Glen Powell plays college professor Gary Johnson in Hit Man (Picture: Brian Roedel/Netflix)
However, he meets his match in prospective client Madison (Adria Arjona), who he strikes up a relationship with and a steamy affair ensues.
Director Richard Linklater told Netflix Tudum: ‘It’s about identity and self and passion. But on a plot level, it’s just a guy who gets in a little too deep. His passions lead him in a direction where he’s deceiving someone he’s in love with, and being someone else. They have to deal with those repercussions.’
The film’s synopsis adds that the popular movie is ‘inspired by an unbelievable true story’.
Hit Man is based on a 2001 Texas Monthly article that Linklater came across, explaining how Johnson ended up working as a fake hit man for the police in his area.
He had been so successful in his role, the article reveals, that he had been hired by more than 60 Houston-area residents ‘to shoot, stab, chop, poison, or suffocate their enemies, their romantic rivals, or their former loved ones’.
Richard Linklater’s Hit Man is inspired by a true story (Picture: Netflix)
Jennifer Lopez’s controversial hit Atlas has ben bumped off the top spot (Picture: Ana Carballosa/Netflix)
The film’s success means that controversial hit Atlas, starring Jennifer Lopez, has been bumped down to second place in the Netflix chart, after spending two weeks at the top since its release on 24 May.
Despite receiving a measly 18% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, the sci-fi release has proved popular with Netflix subscribers, receiving an enormous 68.7 million total views since its release.
Elsewhere, the Ice Age franchise is seeing new success on the platform, with the third installment, Ice Age: Collision Course, and fifth film, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, landing third and fourth place on Netflix’s most-watched list.
The two animated films racked up a total 8.9 million views between Monday 3 and Sunday 9 June.
Hit Man is available to stream on Netflix now.
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