It’s rare to find an intelligent action film, one that’s armed with brains as
well as brawn. Films of this type are so rare that it’s even hard for me to
name a few off the top of my head. John Frankenheimer’s Ronin immediately comes
to mind, as does John McTiernan’s The Hunt For Red October.
When I initially heard about the basic premise of Taken, which has an ex-CIA spy
on the hunt in France for his teenage daughter, who was abducted by a sex slave
ring, I originally wrote it off as being just another dopey action flick. Yet
once I heard that the lead part was played by the superb Liam Neeson, who
managed to give a good, solid performance even in a piece of tripe like
Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, I decided to give Taken a try.
Directed by Pierre Morel, and produced and co-written by Luc Besson (who
directed The Fifth Element), Taken is a lean, mean
little film that cuts right to the chase--in some ways, literally. Neeson’s
on-screen daughter, sympathetically played by Maggie Grace, isn’t actually
abducted until a half hour into the film’s 90 minute running time. But the first
half hour is wisely spent setting up the main character and his personal life,
which is pretty bleak. Neeson’s ex-spy had quit his job so he could be closer to
his daughter, who lives with her mother and extremely wealthy stepfather. It’s
hard to compete for your own daughter’s affections when you buy her a karaoke
machine for her birthday, and her stepfather buys her a real live horse.
Initially denying his underage daughter permission to take a trip to Paris with
her equally youthful friend--for he’s a man who had dealt with the underbelly of
the world in his prior career--Neeson's character reluctantly agrees to let her
go away. Neeson expertly shows the anguish of having to listen to his daughter
being abducted over the phone; all while quickly recording the conversation and
instructing his daughter to shout out whatever description of her abductors she
can give. It’s at this point that the film then goes into hyper drive as Neeson
arrives in France and starts hunting those who are normally predators themselves.
One might be tempted to invoke the gritty mood of the recent James Bond movies with
Daniel Craig--but Neeson’s character is vastly different.
He’s a determined man using all of his spy skills to go on a single-minded
mission to find his little girl, and in doing so, he becomes sort of an avenging
angel whose actions are extremely satisfying to watch--even if some of his
tactics go way over the edge of decency. He’s fighting fire with fire against a
pack of lowlifes, and director Morel milks this concept for all it’s worth.
Morel is superb at building up the suspense leading to the showcase action
pieces, which make them the ultimate payoff for the viewer, who cheers Neeson on
throughout the film. Despite a few silly moments, such as an unneeded Disney
moment the very end, Taken is an enthralling ride that thankfully never veers
into the over the top excess of most low-rent action films. Much like its main
character, Taken stays focused on what’s really important: which is telling a
rip-roaring action/revenge tale with style and intelligence.
--SF
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