The Killers (1964)'s activity

Don Siegel's 1964 version of The Killers really leaves Hemingway behind to craft a remix of the 1946 film (script courtesy of Star Trek's Gene Coon). The scene in the diner is completely gone, and so the killers (Lee Marvin and Clu Gulager, who make great bullies) walk into their victim's place of employment and shoot him. Done. The man (John Cassavetes) stands there and takes it, though if the other characters didn't mention it constantly, I don't know that it would necessarily read that way. The twist on the original film's inventions is the removal, distortion or streamlining of 1946's Noir clichés, doing away with the insurance investigator, for example, and instead making the title characters do the work. Marvin's becomes obsessed with the moment and as things come to light, wouldn't mind retiring on the missing heist money. All the names are changed and though it's got a similar structure as the 1946 Killers, the plot points are different, and Siegel pushes it more into the action category, the Noir towards the lurid. Not sure I buy Angie Dickinson as a Femme Fatale - she seems genuinely loving - but the ambiguity is what makes it interesting. The heavies: Ronald Reagan (his last film) and Mr. Ropper, a weird combo that took me out of the movie whenever they were on screen. Both Henry Mancini and John Williams supplied music, but he look is 60s TV, with the old desert back roads and studio lots (I guess we moved off of Florida faster than it seemed). I was entertained, and they certainly didn't make the same movie Siodmak had, but they also didn't make Hemingway's story either! Given the film's DNA, I was expecting better.