The Contract

The Contract is a 2006 German-American action thriller film directed by Bruce Beresford and written by television writer Stephen Katz and John Darrouzet. The Contract stars Morgan Freeman as professional assassin Frank Carden and John Cusack as a teacher who gets entangled into his latest assignment during a camp trip with his son. Released direct to video in the United States and Europe, The Contract received little critical notice despite its high-profile cast. Plot Frank Carden (Morgan Freeman) is a professional assassin who has been hired to kill a reclusive billionaire named Lydell Hammond Sr., a vocal opponent of stem cell research. Carden's plan goes awry when he gets injured in a car accident and ends up in the hospital. When the hospital staff see his gun, they call the police. They are able to peel away his false identity and federal marshals are called in to pick him up. Widower Ray Keene (John Cusack), a high school gym teacher, ex-cop and well-intentioned but not very able dad to Chris (Jamie Anderson), belatedly realizes the need to bond with his son when the latter gets caught smoking marijuana and takes him hiking in the wilderness. Carden is being driven through that same wilderness by the marshals but his men stage a rescue attempt. The car is crashed and most of the marshals end up dead. The surviving marshal asks Keene to take the prisoner to the authorities and then dies of his injuries. Ray and Chris have to get Carden out of the wilderness and hand him over to the authorities. Carden's men, highly skilled ex-military thugs, track them down to rescue Carden and kill the Keenes. The pursuit brings a couple, Sandra and Lochlan (Megan Dodds and Ryan McCluskey) into the crossfire, with Lochlan being killed by Carden's men. In a tense standoff in a cabin in the woods, Carden's friends turn up and Keene agrees to let Carden go. Just at that moment, one of Carden's thugs bursts in and punches Chris, causing Keene to panic and kill him, while Sandra shoots the other as he enters firing. Carden escapes, taking Chris as a hostage, while the local police rescue Sandra and Keane. Miles (Alice Krige), Carden's mission handler, tells Davis (Corey Johnson), Carden's recent recruit, to kill Carden and Chris and to make it look like Carden did it. She also tells him to kill Keene in case Carden told him anything about his job.