Taken Review and Rental Queue 4

Taken Review: B+

Liam Neeson steals the show in this action oriented crime thriller. Of course, there isn’t much for him to steal, considering most of his co-stars spend most of the movie safe off screen while he goes out and handles the dirty work. Which is completely fine by me. It does make talking about performances a bit difficult, however. Maggie Grace plays his seventeen year old daughter, who goes off to Paris with her friend and is subsequently kidnapped, and she does her part respectably. Lots of screaming, fear, and teenage angst. Famke Janssen spends a few minutes playing her mother, though, really, there isn’t a lot of time spent with the character. She’s a mom, remarried and irritated by her former husband’s choices. Nothing ground breaking there.

Did I mention Liam Neeson? The sole reason any one needs to see this film is to watch him beat up and/or kill every bad guy that comes into his line of vision. He is at his best, and that’s saying a lot considering this is the same man that played one of the greatest Jedi Masters to ever teach a Padawan the way of the force, Qui-Gon Jinn as well as a particularly awesome Batman villain in Batman Begins. So I had high hopes for the action going in, and the film did not disappoint. Liam Neeson is a one-man wrecking crew, specializing in the demolition of human lives and private property in foreign countries.

In all fairness, he did warn the bad guys that he was going to come after him. They really should have listened.

The writing is not spectacular, as far as the dialogue is concerned. The story is familiar, if you’ve seen movies like Trade or… just about any film involving a kidnapped love one. There are some particularly painful moments of awkward line delivery, even from Neeson. One scene jumps to mind, when he’s on the phone with his daughter and delivers some classic ‘plot development’ lines. “What? You want to meet for lunch tomorrow, alone? Sounds good!” The positive side of it is that once the kidnapping happens the dialogue is limited to the high octane thrill ride, leaving no room for uncomfortable conversation or half hearted attempts at character building.

And that’s a good thing.

The sheer speed of this movie is mind blowing. It redefines ‘pacing’ as ‘hold on to your seats and try not to blink’. It is a full-throttle adventure, and it never lets you lose interest. There is no time to be bored, save in the first twenty minutes or so as the scene is being set. Once Neeson gets his guns and gets to work all the audience can do is buckle up and hope not to be hit by any stray bullets or sprays of blood. It’s more than entertaining, because it knows exactly who it’s playing to. This is one of those movies that knows just what its audience wants, and delivers a nearly perfect mix of those demands.

Some of the camera shots do force the action down your throat, unfortunately. There is an epic chase scene through a construction site and, while still very cool, the violently shaking camera almost detracts from the drama and intensity of the moment. It makes it so difficult to know who is tumbling down a ditch, and which car we’re supposed to be following. Yes, that’s a choice by the director, but it doesn’t seem like a particularly needed one. The scene would have worked just as well with a serious of straight cuts sans wobbling.

The movie does ask you to believe a number of far fetched things. Like, for example, the unwavering badassness that is Liam Neeson. In the business it’s called ‘willing suspension of disbelief’ and it is utilized very well here. For the sake of the story it seems perfectly acceptable that one man can (literally) shoot his way into an entire covert organization that has probably been doing kidnappings like this for years, and that no one else has been able to get close to. He can cause car wrecks, leap from bridges, and run for days without tiring, because that’s how well trained he is. Why question it?

Taken is fun. It’s interesting. There are some moments of weak writing and dumb conversation. It’s not believable one hundred percent of the time. It won’t ever win any awards. But it’s good. Very good. So go see it already.




Rental Queue 4:

Love, Actually
A total chick flick, Love Actually is one of the sweetest movies around. Excellent acting from a truly remarkable cast makes this a great romance movie. Good for a night in, a pick me up, or a jaunt through good ol’ England, it’s one of my favorite movies. The recommendation comes from Liam Neeson’s performance here, which is very subtle but painfully honest. He plays a recently widowed father of a young boy who is struggling with his own crisis of love. He and Emma Thompson share some good scenes, but of course the rest of the movie going on around them is also a great watch.

Les Miserables
No, this one isn’t the musical. It’s an adaptation of the book, with Liam Neeson playing the bread-stealing, jail-escaping, child-adopting Jean Valjean. Of course, it’s not a straight rendition, so fans of the canon might be a bit disappointed in the changes here. I, however, find the story to be perfect for the cast. The copper that chases Valjean over the years is played by Geoffrey Rush, and is one of his finest performances. Just after a certain swashbuckling, mutineer of a pirate, anyway. Uma Thurman and Claire Danes also lend their familiar faces and talents to this flick, making it that much more of a must-see.

Star Wars: Episode 1 – The Phantom Menace:
Yeah. Star Wars. Are you surprised? Once again, Liam Neeson offers a great performance in a fairly unlikely role. Here he plays Qui Gon Jinn, Master to the young (and strikingly handsome) Obi-Wan Kenobi. It is difficult not to fall in love with Qui Gon, which is why Neeson was the perfect casting choice. His every scene makes this iteration of the franchise bearable, even after young Anakin Skywalker and Jar Jar Binks come into the picture. Plus, the fight at the end between Qui Gon, Obi-Wan and Darth Maul is amazing.

Trade
With a story similar to that of Taken, it was hard for me not to think about this film while writing my review. Taken has more action and moves a lot faster than Trade, but the similarities remain. The plots both focus on children being abducted and forced in to prostitution rings. Trade just swings it out into a broader scope, a man’s journey to find his daughter becoming a battle to save others from the same fate. Kevin Kline is really subdued in this part, but his strong performance serves him well and depicts a new character for the versatile actor.

Blown Away
A bit of a random tie in here. In my Film Genres class we recently watched High Noon, in which a young Lloyd Bridges costars. Just before that I had been working my way through some Jeff Bridges films, and I remembered that this father/son duo have been in a couple of movies together. Blown Away is an action flick about explosions and running around. There’s more to it than that, but the plot is fairly simple and, really, the most important parts are the bombs. Tommy Lee Jones, the bad guy, and Jeff Bridges, the good guy, both play with Irish accents, and Lloyd Bridges plays Jeff’s mentor. It’s almost sweet to watch, if you weren’t worried about the both of them blowing up every moment.