Oskar Schindler as an action hero? It works: Liam Neeson is fetching in ‘Taken’

Liam Neeson’s latest thriller takes the Oscar-nominee to the dark side of the European underworld, where we learn that what goes on behind closed doors is rarely as innocuous as a meeting between the Department of Justice and Rochester city leaders to discuss “verbal abuse.”

     Covert government operative Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) has just retired to move closer to his teenage daughter Kim (Maggie Grace) and his timing couldn’t be worse: Kim’s just told him that she wants to move to Paris with a friend. Mills’ experience, and his gut, tell him that it’s a bad idea, but he reluctantly agrees with a few conditions, one of which is a daily phone call. On arrival, though, the teen, oblivious to the consequences of her naivety, doesn’t call. Kim’s been abducted by an international organization and Mills must use all of his Black Op prowess (and unfortunately none of Jedi Master Qui-Gon’s) to track his daughter’s captors and rescue her.
     Taken is a ninety-one minute thrill ride. It’s fast and intense, but it’s not for everyone. For example, one of the “spotters” who engages vulnerable girls at the airport has a rather unfortunate meeting with the front grille of a speeding truck – an incredible “gasp” moment that is as shocking as it is satisfying ... for those that appreciate that sort of “comeuppance,” anyway.
     Neeson is exquisite as the even-keeled father whose job has made him “not paranoid, but aware” and though he’s about as far from Oskar Schindler as may be humanly possible, he emotes a protective hero aura that is paradoxically similar as he navigates the dark and gritty side of Europe necessarily racking-up a high body count along the way.
     Taken "took" the number one spot this week grossing almost four times as much as co-release New in Town. Perhaps that’s because the Renee Zellweger / Harry Connick Jr. film was advertised as Minnesota-faire but actually shot in Winnipeg (New Ulm, indeed!). But more likely it’s because audiences enjoy a good thriller where the bad guys get theirs in the end (or in the back, as the case may be).
     Neeson’s is one of the best of the kidnap-genre which apparently permits only one release per decade (e.g., Mel Gibson’s Ransom in 1996 and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Commando in 1985). View the trailer and you’ll be Taken, too.

3 Honks

MPAA Rating: PG-13 for intense sequences of violence, disturbing thematic material, sexual content, some drug references and language.

View the trailer here: http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1809834197/trailer.

And see what else the Med City Movie Guy is up to here:
http://postbulletin.typepad.com/med_city_movie_guy/2008/08/shameless-self.html..

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