Not The Hard Hitting Action Thriller I Was Hoping For

Rating: 4/10 (3 June 2011)

The trailer for Taken had me gripped. I thought to myself, this is what I'm talking about. A gritty revenge thriller staring to impressive Liam Neeson. When watching the trailer, I was being reminded of the last two Bourne films, which I loved. Although I didn't see it at the cinema I was always wanting to watch it and when I did, I felt very let down.
The main problem is that the trailer showed a basic outline for the film. A father who has a history with the special forces tries to find his kidnapped daughter in Europe. I was wondering when the film started what twists would occur and how intense the action would be. Well, the trailer gave me the film. There is no extension on the story other then Liam Neeson goes to Paris and kills everyone who gets in his way of getting his daughter back. That was it. The best moments of action were wasted by too much use of the hand held camera, meaning most the time I struggled to see what was going on. Neeson's character is very boring and the film is completely dependent on the action.
The film does have entertaining moments, but nothing special enough for me to recommend it. Most of my friends who like the film have praised it's awareness of the sex trade industry in Europe. But it doesn't, it just uses that as an excuse for the film to become more darker, but nothing else. For me personally, the best revenge thriller to be released in the past few years is Man on Fire. The film was brilliantly directed and had characters we genuinely felt for. This film really does fall short of the mark when comparing it to Man on Fire.
There are entertaining set pieces and it is good to see Liam Neeson getting his hands dirty, but it takes more then that to make a good thriller. I understand that I am in a minority with Taken having it been given a 7.9 vote on it's IMDb page, but I feel let down by the film and that this type of film has been made before and been much better.