In the special features of the DVD version of "The Assignment," there is an interesting montage of photographs from the behind-the-scenes work on the film, especially the work on make-up with Michelle Rodriguez's character of the hit-man Frank Kitchen.
But the still photos do not convey the outstanding work that Rodriguez turned in with the challenge of playing two characters. One is a man, and the other is a woman, who still has the self-identity of a man.
The LGBT community may not be thrilled with both the premise and the delivery of this character. Still, the role of Kitchen was compelling and was matched in intensity by the character of Dr. Rachel Jane, as played by Sigourney Weaver.
In one of the most fascinating moments of the film, Dr. Jane is delivering a deposition on camera from the mental institution in which she has been consigned for multiple homicides and medical malpractice. While she is sitting upright in the chair, she is wearing a suit and tie. With her short haircut, it is difficult not to assume that Dr. Jane is a man.
Another twist in the film occurs with the appropriately named character "Johnnie" (Caitlin Gerard). Johnnie is a nurse and sometime prostitute who becomes infatuated with Frank, and the relationship takes a sharp turn after the gender confirmation surgery performed on Frank.
The film becomes overly abstract when Dr. Jane quotes Edgar Allan Poe's essay "The Philosophy of Composition," and seems to believe that she is an "artist," who aspires to create a better world through the deploying her surgical skills in an illegal medical practice. That point flew over the head of the psychiatrist who was examining her, and it will probably fly over the heads of film audiences as well.
