So I saw Taken recently, and thought I’d talk about. Taken is an action/drama that was released in January, starring Liam Neeson.
The basic premise, as the video shows, is that Liam Neeson is a former covert agent of sorts that worked for the government. His daughter goes out of country for a trip and while away is kidnapped. Liam, like any good father, isn’t going to stand for that. And Liam, unlike most fathers, has the exact skills needed to find her and save her and get revenge on the kidnappers.
The movie actually doesn’t really begin at -that- exact point. There is a nice set up of about a half hour to forty-five minutes I think. We are introduced to Liam’s character, Bryan Mills. We are shown what his life is like, his devotion to his daughter, and the kind of determination and knowledge he has. We are even given a quick preview of the sorts of skills he will be using throughout the movie.
At about the thirty to forty-five minute mark Bryan’s daughter is kidnapped. This is when we see that speech that Bryan gives in the trailer above. He quickly gathers what intel he can, even going so far as to have his daughter scream every detail about the bad guys she can see as she’s kidnapped. And it’s not long before a deadline of 96 hours is given. The guys that would know say that if she isn’t found in 96 hours, she’ll never be found. And thus begins the chase.
And for the rest of the movie until the end there is non stop action, fights, explosions, car chase scenes, and more. This is an action movie. Once the action begins, there is very little dialogue, except where absolutely necessary, and very few moments to stop and catch your breath.
I don’t mean this in a bad way either. It is a heart thumping, intense, and fun to watch.
Liam proves himself to be a great actor again in the process. At no point does he become Jackie Chan or Jason Statham and that’s almost noticeable. The fight scenes are slower than recent movies have been. And more about power or simple training than a strange rare martial art of fluid grace.
He also never loses that voice. A few people have ‘the voice’ such as Liam and Morgan Freemen. No matter what they say, it’s almost comforting and soothing. Which at times can make for a very disturbing feeling. Liam’s voice lulls you slightly and then you realize he is describing how he is going to torture someone. It actually makes it more real in some ways. Because he is very calm. Cool collected.
I also appreciate the fact that he isn’t invulnerable in this movie and will get injured.
The movie isn’t without its flaws however. It runs just a little too long. There’s apparently 46,000 women who have also been kidnapped and look exactly like his daughter right down to hair color and cut from the behind leading to far to many ‘is it her?’ moments. Bryan warns everyone that if they don’t just give him his daughter he will kill him, and I began to wonder after guy number 300 died why someone wouldn’t just believe him. But much of this is minor nitpicks, honestly.
But my ultimate feeling on Taken is: B+. If you are in the mood for a nonstop action movie that delivers the thrill of violence, Taken is your movie. It’s not gory necessarily (although there is gore) and it’s not without its problems. But it makes for a good time. This is what I call a compromise movie. And that’s exactly what it was. I wanted to see Watchman, my date wanted to see Shopaholic and we settled on Taken. And both enjoyed it.
It’s a least a renter. And I didn’t feel bad about paying theater prices. But if you’ve seen it, tell me what you think. I’d be interested to know.
Canterrain
March 26th, 2009 at 5:05 am
Taken = sheer awesomeness, and Liam Neeson = the ultimate badass.
March 26th, 2009 at 6:46 am
First while on this subject- I want to publicly express my condolences to Liam Neeson in the loss of his beautiful wife. This is so heartbreaking. I hope he and their sons get through this time with support and love of those close to them.
Regarding Taken- my opinion is not as glowing as CT or Brent. I would give it a C at best and here’s why: I found that the script was a nightmare of wooden dialogue with ZERO character development.
There were a lot of unresolved things that frustrated me as well, namely the scene with the young women chained. He left and nothing was ever done! HELLO?!! And there were several moments like that throughout the film. But most of all, was the ‘ta da’ ending. It was one of those films where it seemed like the producer suddenly said, “Hey! We’re going to run out of film- wrap it up!”
Now, I do agree, Liam is a DELIGHTFUL badass. (Well, to me, he’s just plain delightful.) His soft spoken threats make the hair stand up on my neck. He WAS the film. And yes, it was rip roaring popcorn eating fun seeing him do his ‘thing’. That part worked. But the movie could have been so much more in the hands of a more capable screenplay writer. I didn’t care about the mother or the daughter as much as I should have. They were never fleshed out and made real. The villains weren’t either.
I know, it’s an entertainment flick. But you can still create plausible, living characters in a movie like this.
So my grade:
Liam- gets an A++ for being hot, hunky, and a badass.
The movie gets a D- on the script.
So the composite is a C or C-.
March 26th, 2009 at 8:47 am
I have to say that I disagree with every negative point you brought up iowabarbidoll. I think that all of the characters, with the exception of the step father, were developed incredibly well to the point that you needed to care about them. You were never meant to care about the mother but the fact that you didn’t care about the daughter is simply that you didn’t find a connection to Neeson’s character.
He couldn’t stop and help every girl that he found on the way. The entire premise of the movie is that he had a very short amount of time to get his daughter back and doing anything he had to in order to accomplish that. I really didn’t feel it was a ta-da ending either as I wasn’t expecting anymore closure than it gave me and it actually gave me more by Neeson’s character bringing his daughter to take singing lessons. If this had been a brighter hollywood movie it most likely would have ended on the boat with some touching words being said and then loud music busting out and cutting to credits.
March 26th, 2009 at 9:25 am
Touche, Sam, and I appreciate you viewpoint. We all watch movies with our own filters and expectations. Me coming from the standpoint of a divorced mom with a very uncomfortable visitation situation that is in arbitration, I may be watching the movie from a differing angle.
But I still stand behind my opinion that his leaving a room full of dying women and never making another mention of that, or the fate his daughter’s best friend and shifting gears to the happy vocal audition was oddly jarring. Again, as the mom of a daughter, the fates of all of those girls was something I wanted to know- not just his daughter… But this, again, is just my opinion.
March 26th, 2009 at 10:47 am
I probably favored this movie better because I went in thinking of it as just an action flick. It has a very Die Hard 1 like formula. A set up for the plot at the beginning followed by mostly blood guts bullets and the occasional very small break for needed dialogue.
If you look at it expecting nothing else, it doesn’t disappoint.
I’d forgotten, but I too found myself questioning “what about all the other girls?” So I definitely see Barb’s point there.
March 26th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
I wanna see this movie, but I think I’m gonna wait until I can catch it on HBO. I’m not gonna fork over 10 bucks to grind my teeth anxiously for an hour in the theater. In other news, please make sure you add commas between your tags, CT!
March 26th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Whoospie… I knew that. It was late. Whoops.
March 26th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
CT- that’s what I did wrong- I saw Taken becuase I thought it was more of a psychological thriller- I didn’t realize until after you mentioned that that it was more of a ‘Die Hard’ type show. I rarely see those types of movies- they just aren’t my thing, so that’s probably why I didn’t enjoy it too much.
I did love Liam though and I would reiterate that the scenes where he’s opening up the cans of whoop ass are WORTH seeing.
March 31st, 2009 at 5:17 am
I’d forgotten how much I adore Liam Neeson! I took your tip and saw Taken today, and now I remember…
He walks a fine line, though. There is only so much pain a main character can inflict on others, no matter if they’re bad guys, before you go “Ooh, isn’t that a little over the top?”. Electrocuting that one guy came pretty close, as did seeing all those girls and not stopping to do something… But Neeson makes it work!
April 2nd, 2009 at 2:45 pm
Barb — your right about the whoop ass scenes. The best is where he’s interrotorturing that one guy with a light switch. He warns the dude what will happen if he leaves the light on, and then when he finishes, he does it anyway. You just don’t see that kind of dedication anymore.
April 2nd, 2009 at 3:10 pm
To Barb and others, regarding the young woman that Neeson’s character rescues and treats, I agree that it would have been pleasing to the audience to know what happened to her. Even a brief throwaway scene with Neeson making a phone call or something like to have someone take care of her. This obviously was a decision made by the director, and perhaps he made it to reinforce the hyperfocused sensation of Mills having a singular goal, with everything else falling by the wayside except where he could glean information. Given what we already know of Mills’ character, and how disgusted he is by his longtime French acquaintance’s involvement in the police corruption, perhaps the director was relying on the audience’s ability to make the leap that Mills did what he could for the young woman with the time and resources available to him.
As to the brothel at the construction site, it would have been nigh impossible for one man to rescue who knows how many drugged women in various states of health. The French police were already part of the problem, so they weren’t an option for assistance, and Mills’ former security compatriot had made it plain he wouldn’t help Mills in the least (“I sit behind a desk, now.”)
The situation was similar for the site where the girls were held and “conditioned,” where Mills found his daughter’s friend dead of an overdose: reinforcement men would likely show up even though he had taken out the current group, and what could one man realistically do for all the women there? Mills had one goal: to find his daughter and meet out retribution to her kidnappers and those involved. Additionally, since the operation was part of the corruption infesting the French police, even if Mills had had the time to do something for those women, his efforts would surely have been hampered or squelched by *him* being arrested.
If you’ve watched any documentaries on the sex trade, you know that the situations presented in Taken are, unfortunately, true to life. Which leads me to the conclusion that a great many men the world over are scum. Mills character was actually rather merciful in giving them clean deaths. I would have inflicted much more lingering pain on all of them–like infection with the most virulent strain of Ebola, for starters…or a pleasant necrotizing fasciitis, ah, yes…