Stars: 2.5 out of 5
Review: “Taken”
Director: Pierre Morel
Release Date: Jan. 30, 2009
From the get-go, “Taken” sets itself up to be full of intense action with a breathtaking sequence where Kim (Maggie Grace) is abducted and stolen into Paris’ seedy underground. Brian (Liam Neeson) calls in favors and flies to Paris and tries to find his daughter before the 96-hour window disappears and she is gone forever.
With his intensity and fervor in full force, Neeson departs from his usual contemplatives roles and delves headfirst into this derivative and hollow action thriller by French director Pierre Morel and written by the same team that gave us the “Transporter” trilogy.
Things immediately go downhill as the story proceeds and action film clichés pile up as frequently as the broken bodies that an invincible, superhuman Brian leaves in his raging wake. The real villain in this is the slave trade, but instead of the issue all we get are scores of nameless and faceless villains who simply exist to be killed by Brian as he wreaks havoc throughout Paris, trying to rescue his daughter. There is no sense of vengeful payback without a face to pin it on, and this film offers villains with no face.
A strength of the film is that it seeks to open our closed eyes to the horror of the slave trade and forced prostitution. It uses subtlety in that area, if only in that area, and there are some powerful moments as we see the abuse inflicted on the innocent. The subtlety is powerful and adds a little reality to an otherwise preposterous and hyperkinetic film.
At a mere 93 minutes, “Taken” flies by at a breakneck speed that requires only eyes and ears to process the journey. Neeson gives it his all with the mediocre script, and it is refreshing to see an older hero with bite. The message of the forced slave trade is commendable, but is used as a plot device to get our hero from one action sequence to the next, which results in a somewhat noble but ultimately artificial effort that diminishes an inherently powerful and necessary message.
