Good Kill

Synopsis: A Las Vegas-based fighter pilot turned drone pilot fights the Taliban by remote control for 12 hours a day, then goes home to the suburbs and feuds with his wife and kids for the other 12. But the pilot is starting to question the mission. Is he creating more terrorists than he's killing? Is he fighting a war without end.
Genre: Drama, Thriller, War
Director(s): Andrew Niccol
Production: IFC Films
  1 nomination.
 
IMDB:
6.4
Metacritic:
63
Rotten Tomatoes:
75%
R
Year:
2014
102 min
Website
779 Views


1

Eyes on Kahili objective.

19:
30 hours.

Entering surveillance hour four.

No sign of target.

Noncombatant approaching.

Two noncombatants.

Fresh op. New heading, 1-8-0.

Insurgents sighted four klicks north,

deploying weapons.

Sensor, slew the ball

to new coordinates.

Eyes on new objective.

Throttling back.

Guns are hot. Target qualifies.

Engage at your discretion.

Roger that.

Civilian bus, one klick south.

Too close, Major.

Get the strike on this pass, or abort.

Copy that.

I can get it.

Rifle when ready.

Master arm hot.

Fly the laser.

Target, lasered.

Three, two,

one, rifle.

Missile away.

Time of flight, 10 seconds.

Splash.

Good kill.

Well, they don't call it

a Hellfire for nothing.

Best use of $68,000 taxpayer dollars

I've seen today.

Master arm off. Weapon's safe.

Laser safe.

Damage assessment.

Come on, Carlos. Tighten up.

What's the body count?

I count six, sir.

But good luck figuring out

which bits go in what casket.

Setting a course for J-bad.

Watch yourself, Tommy.

You're beak-to-beak

with that Reaper relieving you.

- Yes, sir.

- Two o'clock.

MQ-9. American engineering

at its finest.

All right. Hand off to

Captain Christie for recovery.

Is that real?

You ever get to, like,

fly in a war or something?

Blew away six Taliban

in Pakistan just today.

Now I'm going home to barbeque.

Yeah, right.

- It's not my fault.

- Travis, get back here right now.

Get back here

and pick up the crap you just dumped!

Do not walk away from me, young man!

Do not walk away from me.

Travis!

Feel free to step in anytime, Tommy.

I'll talk to him.

I got a call from the principal's office.

He was fighting with another boy.

Did he Win?

Hey, Jesse, how's that book?

You recommend it?

- Sorry the house looks like...

- A bomb hit it?

I didn't say it.

I'd ask how your day was,

but there's a limit...

- I know. I'm sorry.

- How many times

- I can ask the same question.

- Thank you for not asking.

You know he's flunking math.

He needs a tutor.

How much will that cost?

Can't you help him?

Where do you think he gets it from?

I'm the reason he's flunking.

That's true.

I start nights tomorrow.

Okay.

You look miles away.

Seven thousand?

That's a joke.

I think I'm gonna go get a glass of water.

You need anything?

Yeah, I do.

Living the dream, Tommy.

Hey, Dan.

Ladies and gentlemen,

the aircraft you're looking at

is not the future of war.

It is the here and f***ing now.

Any time of day or night,

there are dozens of

these things in the sky

above our theaters of operation.

And most are currently working in the

Garden of Eden they call Afghanistan.

Where they're starting to think

it's their new national bird.

Now, I assume you know

we don't fly them all the way there

from here in Vegas,

but I guess I shouldn't assume anything.

I got food in my fridge

older than most of you.

Now, all take-offs and landings occur

in and around

whatever godforsaken place

we're at war with that day.

That's 'cause these things are a b*tch

to take off and land.

So once they're airborne,

that's when we take over.

And these gentlemen here are gonna

take you through the nuts and bolts

of exactly how we do that.

But before they do, there's one thing

I want to say about this program.

We get a lot of sh*t from the public.

And I've heard

all the bleeding heart arguments.

I've read all the f***ing bumper stickers.

"It's not the air force,

it's the chair-force,"

"waging a Wii war."

It's all a waste of breath

because the United States Air Force

is ordering more drones than jets.

Excuse me, "remotely piloted aircraft."

You can call them whatever you want.

Drones aren't going anywhere.

In fact, they're going everywhere.

But don't think I believe

my own sh*t either.

'Cause we like to dress it up

in fancy language.

Prosecuting a target, a surgical strike,

neutralizing the threat.

Make no f***ing mistake about it.

We are killing people.

So I'm gonna drill this into your heads

every goddamn day.

This ain't f***ing PlayStation.

Even though the brass

don't like to admit it,

our operation was modeled on Xbox.

And half of you were recruited in malls

precisely because

you are a bunch of f***ing gamers.

And war is now a first-person shooter.

But you pull a trigger here,

it's for f***ing real.

Ain't a bunch of pixels

you're blowing up.

It's flesh and f***ing blood.

You pull a trigger here,

someone's gonna go away.

Now, go away.

Dismissed.

Atten-hut!

That's a lot of recruits

for a war that's ending.

So what'd you log?

3,000 hours in F-16s,

six tours, 200 combat sorties

before you got here?

Now they give them 40 hours in

a f***ing Cessna and send them to me.

And pretty soon they won't even do that.

Just shove a joystick

in their clammy mitts on day one.

By the way, I got a new co-pilot for you.

Last test, Carlos pissed hot. Coke.

I mean, I reckon

he wanted to get busted.

You saw how he was shaking.

It was classic burn-out.

You burn out at 24.

I mean, when I was 24,

burn-out hadn't been invented yet.

Is that her there?

Yeah, I know she looks like

a f***ing child.

But she's got 500 hours in Reapers,

100 in Predators.

Top recruit from Holloman.

Listen, word's come down the chain

we're stepping up attacks.

'Cause we got intel that says

they're stepping up attacks.

I mean, it's like my football coach

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Andrew Niccol

Andrew M. Niccol is a New Zealand screenwriter, producer, and director. He wrote and directed Gattaca, S1m0ne, Lord of War, In Time, The Host, and Good Kill. more…

All Andrew Niccol scripts | Andrew Niccol Scripts

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Submitted on August 05, 2018

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