Nothing more than a Director's highly overrated mess.

Rating: 4/10 (19 February 2009)

Alright, I watched the movie about a few weeks ago and after seeing its ratings on IMDb I was expecting a really good action movie with good acting, a wholesome plot and obviously some amazing action. An 8.0 rating on IMDb means it's equal to movies like 'The Matrix' or 'Die Hard'.
Admittedly I'm quite a big action fan, and I do understand the concept of it not being 'realistic'. That's what films are. They're stories. Name me one movie that is completely realistic with no fantasy elements included and I'll give you a million bucks.
However when I saw this movie I was bored, embarrassed during some scenes at how atrocious it was, and I found it to be completely overrated. The action was slow, the cinematography was laughable, the acting from everyone except Neeson was very sub-par and I just felt disappointed. This isn't the action movie that would start a second renaissance, of course not. That's not what I was expecting. I didn't think it'd be anything more than a tour-de-force action film that was pure entertainment and silliness wrapped into a satisfying bubble. And honestly all I got was another second-rate action movie that's not even worth the time and effort to watch unless you're an extreme fan of the genre. I mean, during the scene where Neeson runs to the boat to get his daughter... the camera cuts so many times and there's about a million shots of his car in different angles that I completely forgot what was going on. That's just an example of the many things I thought brought the movie down.
I really don't see how this film deserves the recognition it has received. I've read the forums and people say "well it's an action flick... you're not supposed to take it seriously!" To that I say, why isn't Meet the Spartans in the IMDb 250? "Well, it's a parody flick, you're not supposed to take it seriously"? The same principal applies.
I'm not trying to say the film isn't enjoyable because that's down to tastes. I'm just saying firstly; film technicalities (i.e. the direction, photography, musical score) were atrocious and anyone with a basic knowledge of film and its production will recognize this.
Secondly; the acting of the support cast quite bad. Not Troll 2 bad, but still not something you'd expect to see in a Liam Neeson movie. More like something you'd see in one of Arnold Schwarzenegger's movies from the 80's.
Thirdly; the directing was very amateurish. I felt this constant need to find Pierre Morel and hit him every time the scenes went on too long. He'd be extremely bruised right now.
I really wonder how the screenplay went for this movie, too. I'm guessing the writers/artists got very proud of their ability to draw and started getting excited during the car scenes, resulting in about 200 frames of a car from as many different angles as possible. And the director just went "Hey, why not? It's action, right?".
I haven't mention the plausibility of this movie, because anyone here could go to the LOTR forums and start asking how some old dude with a beard has magical powers, or why some big dude explodes when he loses his ring, and we'd all be stumped for argument other than to say the same lines I've seen being used here.
But for god's sake this is a generic action movie, not an Oscar-deserving masterpiece. If someone can tell me how I'm wrong, why this movie DOES deserve its rating and explain to me what I missed, I will be very grateful.
For anyone who thinks I'm talking nonsense - check out http://uk.rottentomatoes.com/m/taken/?critic=creamcrop and see how they rated this movie. These people are professional critics...