Well acted and written, but overtly stylish in cinematography.

Rating: 7/10 (26 March 2006)

Depending upon the story, screenplay and most of all, acting, I could easily give this film 9 out of 10. Released more or less at the same time with a horde of good 'revenge' movies, "Man on Fire" shines bright with its linear but bold basic plot, turned into a smart screenplay with measured amounts of action and emotion and with some catchy dialogues as well. Denzel Washington again delivers a powerful performance right from the beginning. Dakota Fanning is indeed a promising starlet, and she developed a unexpectedly nice chemistry with Washington. The supporting cast are also worth mentioning, especially Radha Mitchell whose character changed with a sharp contrast during the course of the film. I personally think the talent of Christopher Walken and Mickey Rourke are basically wasted in this film.
But the film's technically superior visual style is quite annoyingly overdone, one must say that. I don't mind the use of color filters and high contrast (I even think they're used better than in 'Traffic' too) but what annoyed me is the random use of shaky visionaries and montage-influenced editing which got tiresome after a while. I think Tony Scott is eager to develop his own trademark by using that style but here he could easily avoid its overuse.