A Walk Among the Tombstones

Plot synopsis:
New York City, 1991Detective Matt Scudder (Liam Neeson) is in a car with his partner. He then enters a bar where cops don't have to pay for their drinks. The bartender serves Matt two liquor shots and a cup of coffee. Two punks then come in and try to take some money, when the bartender says 'no'. They shoot the man in the chest, prompting Matt to take his gun and fire at them. He runs into the street and shoots one man down. The second man and a third drive away. Matt shoots the driver while the final man flees. Matt gets him in the thigh and follows him down some steps. Matt shoots him down.Over the opening credits, we see a woman lying down with her eyes wide open. A man kisses her cheek. Then we see another man next to him. The camera pans back to show the woman's mouth is taped closed. A tear rolls down her cheek.Eight years later, Matt, now a recovering alcoholic, is in a diner about to have a meal when a junkie named Peter (Boyd Holbrook) approaches him, asking Matt for help for Peter's brother. Matt at first doesn't seem interested, but then seemingly out of empathy for the young lad, follows Peter out and goes with him to the home of his brother, Kenny Kristo (Dan Stevens). Kenny knows of Matt's work as a private investigator and offers him $20,000 to find the men that kidnapped and killed his wife, despite Kenny paying the ransom they requested. Matt figures out that Kenny is a drug dealer. Kenny corrects him and says he is a drug trafficker. And he should know the difference. Matt refuses to help him, assuming he simply wants to exact vigilante justice. He closes the lid on the money offered and abruptly walks out.Matt attends an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.Matt returns to his apartment and finds Kenny sitting in the hall outside his apartment waiting for him. He tells her his wife's name (Carrie) to assure Matt that he did care about his wife. Through a flashback, we see the moment Kenny got the phone call from the kidnappers demanding a ransom of $1 million. The kidnapper arrives at this figure by estimating the weight of his wife and how much the equivalent weight in cocaine would fetch. The kidnapper emphasizes he would easily pay this amount for the illicit powder, surely the flesh of his wife should be worth as much. Kenny emphatically pleads he doesn't have that kind of money. The kidnapper casually agrees to cut it in half and demands $500,000. Kenny holds firm and haggles him down to $400,000.To prove that he does in fact have her, the main kidnapper provides a physical description of Carrie's breasts. He threatens to cut off one of Carrie's breasts and send it to Kenny as further proof that he has her. Kenny complies and brings the money to the area described and waits as instructed for Carrie to be placed back in his car. However, She never arrives. He is then told she will be at their home. Kenny races home to find her still absent. He is then told to look in the trunk of an old car in Red Hook. There are several bags in there. Kenny picks one up and cuts it open. Blood spills out.Kenny hands Matt a tape recorder that was left in the trunk. Matt listens to it after Kenny leaves. It contains a recording of Carrie in the throes of the horror the kidnappers perpetrated on her. Carrie is complimented on her beautiful breasts. Whether through fear or sexual arousal, the topless Carrie is able to maintain erect nipples in front of her kidnappers until she screams as her torture and mutilation apparently begins. This gives Matt cause to investigate.Matt looks around Red Hook to get leads. What he knows is that the kidnappers were most likely involved with the D.E.A. All the people he asks say they saw a van and two men close to where Carrie was last seen. Every person Matt asks gives him a different version of what was written on the van, since the two men keep repainting the van.Matt goes to the library to find articles on similar killings. He reads two articles on victims named Marie Gotteskind and Leila Andrersen. Behind him is a street kid named T.J. (Brian "Astro" Bradley) who is being chastised by the librarian for making a mess and sleeping on the premises. Matt intrudes to save the boy from further grilling. He asks him for help with looking for other articles. T.J. translates Marie's surname, Gotteskind, as a German name that means, "Child of God." Together, they learn that a leg was found in a dumpster by a florist, while other bags filled with body parts were in the pond of a cemetery. Matt offers to shake the boys hand to thank him for his help. The boy is not amused and states his time is valuable. How much, Matt asks? Ten dollars, the boy responds. Matt gives him twenty and asks if he'd like to get a burger. The boy advises him that he does not eat meat. But he would none the less like to "get his eat on." At a diner Matt treats TJ to pancakes.Matt goes to the cemetery to speak with the groundskeeper, Jonas Loogan (Olafur Darri Olafsson). At first Loogan is happy to see him, assuming he's a police officer responding to his request for a ride along to help him flesh out the details of a book he is writing. Loogan senses something is not right and gives Matt a fake name of his boss to test him. Matt fails the test, but is unfazed. He questions Loogan about the bags he found in the pond. Loogan is quite forthcoming. Yet, he states he repressed the memory of finding the dead woman in all those bags. He acts upset that Matt reminded him of it. Matt tries to recover by asking him what his book is about. Loogan shrugs him off by saying, "don't patronize me." He then drives away in his garbage collecting vehicle.Matt waits for Loogan across the street from the cemetery after his shift and follows him to his apartment. Matt discovers T.J. has been following him, trying to aid him in detective work. Matt tells him to stop following him. He leaves him to find Leila's fiance Reuben (Mark Consuelos), an out-of-work actor who is working out at home in the afternoon. He also just happens to live in the building across the street from Loogan. Inside his apartment Matt asks Reuben about the last time he saw Leila. He says he was supposed to meet her at a cafe. But instead he witnessed her getting taken into a van by two men and a third - the driver. Matt suspects Reuben of also being a drug dealer. There is a joke here as Matt says, "or would you prefer 'Trafficker'", which is a call back to the distinction Kenny made earlier.Matt looks out the window and sees a cage of birds on the rooftop of the building across the street. He goes to that building and finds a locked shed on the rooftop that belongs to Jonas. The shed is Loogan's writing room. Matt finds a page of unfinished prose he was writing, along with pictures of Reuben and Leila having sex taken from a vantage point directly across, presumably from Jonas's window or the roof top. Jonas finds Matt in there and takes out a knife. Matt convinces him to put it down. Jonas admits that he was the driver when he and the two men kidnapped Leila. He didn't like that she was doing drugs with Reuben, so he conspired with the two men to take her away from there and keep her safe. Instead, they had Jonas drive to a spot where he witnessed the main kidnapper cutting her blouse open and forcing her to choose which of her breasts she wants to keep while he cuts off the other one. Horrified, Jonas fled the scene. Matt asks where he can find them. Jonas feeds his birds and gives Matt one name (Ray) before he jumps off the roof and lands on a car.We meet the two kidnappers, Ray and Albert (David Harbour and Adam David Thompson), in their home, reading about Y2K fears. Ray delivers the line that is uses as the tag line on the poster, "People are afraid of all the wrong things." They drive by the home of another drug trafficker, Yuri Landau (Sebastian Roche). They see Yuri's pretty 14-year-old daughter Ludmilla, better known as Lucia (Danielle Rose Russell), walking her dog. She politely waves to the men as she passes their van, presuming they'd stopped out of kindness to let her pass with her dog. In fact Ray is enchanted by her.Matt goes to a store and asks the owner about Marie Gotteskind. Matt later goes to an apartment where he is struck by the owner and his son since they have apparently been repeatedly accused of killing her. They tell Matt that she was a cop and that she was dealing drugs along with them.Matt comes across T.J. in the streets, now carrying a gun he found. Matt tells him how to use it and then says T.J. should shoot himself in the head because that's all that can happen if he's carrying it.The next day, Matt is followed by a man coming out of a van with East Village Plumbing Supply written on it, similar to the one the kidnappers were driving. Matt gets into an apartment and hides himself. He wraps a scarf around his fist and gets the man to peek in through the window. As he does he smashes through it into the guy's face. Matt then finds out the man is an agent with his partners. They take Matt in a van and drop him off after he asks them about Marie and gets no answers.Matt gets into Peter's apartment where he's about to shoot up. On the wall are dozens of nude paintings of Carrie, as Peter was in love with her. He painted her nude portrait as a gift for Kenny which hangs in his living room. Here though the poses are far more provocative. Matt tells him to tell Kenny that he will return him his money since he doesn't want to be involved in this case anymore.In the rain, T.J. is found by two punks that want their gun back. He tells them he threw it in the river, so they beat him with his backpack. Matt finds him at Bellevue Hospital. There, he learns from the doctor that T.J. has sickle cell anemia, which was triggered by either the rain or the assault. When T.J. wakes up, he asks Matt why he stopped being a cop. Matt reveals that during the shootout (from the opening scene), one of the bullets accidentally struck a 7-year-old girl in the eye, killing her, with his drinking apparently causing him to miss his intended target. Matt has been sober ever since. "It kind of took all the fun out of it," we hear him repeatedly say at the end of each AA sharing session.Ray and Albert break into the Landau home and tase the dog before tasing Lucia and kidnapping her after she tends to her sick mother.Peter finds Matt and brings him to the Landau home where the kidnappers have called and are demanding a ransom for Lucia. Yuri answers and tries to negotiate. Matt takes the phone from him and tells Ray that they won't get a cent if Lucia is harmed. The kidnappers claim that their earlier dismemberment of Carrie was a one time event--they cut Carrie because Kenny cut the ransom payment--but this claim is suspect given that Leila met a similar fate to Carrie. Matt negotiates with Ray to prove that the girl is safe by asking Lucia for the name of her current dog, the name of her previous dog, and what happened to that dog. When Ray succeeds in this, they arrange a drop. Matt calls T.J. on a phone he left him and asks him to go to his place and get a box, and to give it to Peter. T.J. comes with Peter and the box, as T.J. did not trust Peter alone with it.Matt, Kenny, Peter, Yuri, and T.J. all go to the cemetery to meet with the kidnappers. Peter is hiding behind the tombstones with a rifle. They make the exchange, though Lucia's hands are bloodied due to losing several fingers, with Ray making a comment that this happened before the conditions were set. The girl returns to her father, and Albert takes the money. He realizes it's counterfeit and tries to tell Ray before Matt takes out his gun and shoots Ray twice in the chest, though he is saved by his bulletproof vest. Albert shoots at everyone and hits Peter, while Matt manages to get Ray in the side, wounding him. The kidnappers get away in their van while Matt and Kenny tend to a dying Peter. Peter tries admit his love for Carrie, but since he can only say "I loved...", Kenny takes it as an admission of brotherly love, and he returns it. Matt goes to the car and sees T.J. is missing.T.J. snuck into the back of the kidnappers' van and stowed away during their return home. He gets the street name and lets Matt know. In their house, Albert tries to patch up Ray's bullet wound. They go down to the basement where Albert instead strangles Ray with the garrote. Choking the life out of him on the floor. He goes back upstairs to eat. Shortly Matt, Kenny, and T.J. enter the house. Albert casually says, you can have your money back. Matt cuffs Albert to a pipe and leaves him to Kenny. Matt sends T.J. back to his place in a cab. Kenny whacks Albert in the head with a bottle and goes downstairs to find Ray. Albert gets himself loose. Matt decides to go back inside and finish the job, remembering the 12 Steps he heard at an AA meeting--close ups of Matt and a voice over of a woman reciting the 12 steps of AA meetings are interspersed throughout the finalé film, starting from the shoot out in the cemetery, where action is freeze framed as Matt seeming recounts the 12 steps in his head.Upon reentering the house, Matt finds a bloody scene. Albert is not where he left him. He veers down to the basement and sees Kenny dead on the staircase. His hand severed clean off. A pool of blood covers remaining the steps. Matt slips on the blood and falls down the half flight of steps to the bottom. Albert approaches from behind and attempts to strangle him to death with the garrote. As he does this, Matt fires his side arm backwards, but is unable to hit Albert. Matt manages to grapple free as Albert heads to the sink to retrieve a large meat cleaver. Matt eyes the taser Ray had pocketed earlier to protect himself just slipping out of his track pant pocket as he lays head against the far wall. He lunges for the taser just as Albert launches at him with the cleaver, nailing him in the groin causing Alberts blow to land in the shoulder of his dead partner Ray. He tasers him once again in the neck. Matt grabs a gun on the floor. As Albert begins to speak a word or two Matt shoots him clean in the head, cutting off anything he was attempting to say.Matt returns home to find T.J. sleeping on the couch. He spots a drawing that T.J. made of himself as a superhero with a sickle insignia on the chest. Matt sits down and slowly closes his eyes. When he wakes up, T.J. is gone, preferring not to have anyone looking after him.

Tags: suspenseful, neo noir, murder, violence, flashback, revenge, sadist

Review:
Doubting whether audiences do really know the existence of this crime film due to poor marketing, Liam Neeson's name alone however has no problem at all to draw a solid walk-ins, and surprisingly it turns out to be a compelling story compared to his previous roles.
Not much of plot twists, but certain creepy moments with solid scores, riveting performance from the hero himself and the supporting casts, nasty and eerie crime heavily based on drugs and alcohol, the surprisingly "muted" ending style are more than enough to guarantee an intense, enjoyable, old-fashioned and watchable psycho- thriller..
It gets even better when explores around its main man: Liam Neeson is now commonly used as an action hero, but here the film rather uses the better side of that reputation which is keeping the audience feel that he is a dangerous man to deal with, even without revealing much of the fists and gunpoint, it's still a totally compelling depiction of his character's cold, brooding personality.My personal enjoyment to the film is how refreshing to see a mystery film this straightforward and unpretentiously dark in modern cinema.
is that, long before Neeson became Hollywood's most late-blooming action hero, he was an actor.A-C-T-O-R And a pretty good one at that.And that is what makes this film a lot better than the other reviews would have you believe.Yes, I confess, a guilty pleasure, I loved TAKEN.
Ahh yes...the time has come for one of my fairly recent favorite traditions...the annual release of a Liam Neeson movie where he is just being a bad a**.
As for the examples of slightly less awesome Neeson bad a** movies, these are the ones like "Unknown", and some may even say "Non-Stop" but I actually enjoyed that one."A Walk Among the Tombstones" falls into that category.
Their relationship is interesting at first because it's unclear as to why Scudder continues to come into contact with this kid besides the fact that perhaps by helping this kid, he can make up for a lot of sins he has committed in his past.The film can be slow at times, but Neeson is almost in every scene and his presence alone keeps you engaged in every step he takes.
When the fourteen year-old daughter of a drug dealer is also kidnapped, Scudder heads up a group to rescue the teenager."A Walk among the Tombstones" is a gloomy crime film developed in slow pace, but with a complex story.
This time, he plays Matthew Scudder - of the popular Lawrence Block crime novel series (17 books).Director Scott Frank (The Lookout) works to create a 1970's feel, although the film opens up as a flashback to 1991, and quickly fast forwards to 1999 NYC.
He works for "favors", not a paycheck.Other support work comes courtesy of Dan Stephens ("Downton Abbey"), Boyd Holbrook, and creepy cemetery groundskeeper (is there another type?) Olafur Darri Olafsson, who creates yet another memorable character with limited screen time (see "True Detective").Mr. Neeson gets plenty of telephone action, which plays right into the strength of Taken, and it's pretty amazing how much WALKING he does throughout the story.
￼Neeson plays Matt Scudder, a disgraced ex-cop and now P.I. who is  hired by a drug dealer (Dan Stevens, taking a giant leap from his  Matthew Crawley character from Downton Abbey) to find his wife's killer  and exact revenge.
Liam Neeson towers in this film, very believable and a brooding presence of regretfulness and one making a living without a path anymore in life but one whose street savvy and street instincts are still honed.While still living with a moral code, his past and need to look out for the small guy, gets him dragged into a case where there are elements playing from various side, and one which raises a question on to what you should or should not do in the case of kidnappings, with Scudder(Neeson) showing how to take control and push forward.This is a great detective thriller, keeps you engrossed, great script, strong acting and thoroughly enjoyable and.
i just need to say that the guy who handled the cinematography for this picture is a genius and deserves some recognition even though i know for a fact he is not gonna win an Oscar for his work in this movie because simply it's not the kind of movies that gets the academy awards.as my review for the rest of the movie i thought it was good from the point of view of a guy who misses the old days of the 70's to the 90's because honestly it's became an event to watch a realistic movie these years it's either a superhero movie or some kind of an adaptation to a teen favorite bestseller.
Scudder gets himself caught in a dark web of drug traffickers, psychotic serial killers and lonely denizens in the underbelly of New York City.Lately, Liam Neeson is more known for his high-adrenaline action films like "Taken" and "Taken 2".
Liam Neeson is back in his gruff everyman-turned-action-hero role as former cop Matt Scudder.
This is fine for 1 movie, but seeing it a few times now (with this film too) makes it more repetitive than a washing machine.The moral of the story is that 2 psychotic killers are kidnapping drug dealer's wives/girlfriends and making sure they enjoy every bit of them.
This was the only decent part of the story until they happen to ask Liam (a retired cop) for help and the entire movie collapses like a straw house in a blizzard.
I never cared for the idea of Liam Neeson as an action star and tend to avoid movies where he's an action lead (no, I've never seen TAKENbring on the hate).
Liam Neeson is Matt Scudder, a retired police detective and recovered alcoholic who now makes a living as a private investigator.
What follows is a tense, occasionally exciting, investigation that ultimately fails to bring any real surprises but works because of Neeson and usual power performance.I found it interesting that A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES was set in 1999 and it was intent on making sure we never forgot it.
We get a hint at the complexity behind the character and, while this movie didn't blow me away, I'd be open to seeing further Scudder films.I enjoyed A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES but I'll admit there's nothing exceptional about it.
We all love Liam Neeson as the badass action hero who kills bad guys in every scene.
Not only they have failed entirely to differentiate themselves from a single episode of an everyday detective TV show but the pace of the movie is much slower than of a TV show and the character development is meaningless and entirely cliché.The production team has simply put all their money betting on Neeson's reputation and success as an action hero.
All the clichés of a Liam Neeson action flick exist in this movie and by watching a single episode of The Wire, CSI, Dexter, etc., you are already ahead in terms of the ticket price and your precious time..
I'm a big Liam Neeson fan like many people who would be looking to check this film out but do yourselves a favor and totally avoid this.
If you like the ongoing obsession called True Detective, just dump this review and run to a theater to watch the Scott Frank's deceitful craft A Walk Among the Tombstones, based upon Lawrence Block's 1992 novel of the same title.
Liam Neeson plays illegal private detective Matthew Scudder assigned a reluctant case of a barbarous gay couple who kidnap a drug trafficker Kenny Kristo's beautiful wife.
Kenny pays the ransom only to be served with wrapped severed body parts of his wife, deeming the killers nothing less than psychos who turn out to serial.Tombstones is unlike Taken and the stint of films Neeson had after that.
As I said in my opening paragraph, this is more of a slow moving film than what we are use to seeing in a Liam Neeson movie.
The film moves slowly along as we find out pieces of Matt Scudder's(played by Liam Neeson) past.
Going into the film I read a few reviews saying this is another Liam Neeson Taken movie.
I like actor Liam Neeson, and while I didn't review it for this site, I did see and enjoyed his film Non Stop, from earlier this year.
The film is a detective story of sorts and Liam Neeson's character, Matt Scudder, is an interesting character who really carries the film, but also gives much more to the film as well because of the character's back story as well as his mostly calm nature, but when he means business we know that he has the capability to use and be violent as well.
STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning Following a traumatic incident in a bar a few years ago, Detective Matt Scudder (Liam Neeson) is now a private investigator, who takes on various tough assignments.
With the help of streetwise delinquent TJ (Astro), he must race against time to bring them down.Now in the later stages of his life and career, Liam Neeson has topped the niche market of older guys in action hero roles, managing a smooth, savvy charisma that a lot of the testosterone fuelled younger guys probably couldn't manage.
The writers were clearly going for a "wise man helps damaged kid" scenario that was meant to add heart to to the film, which I think mostly failed, as Astro speaks like he hates Neeson for the entire movie, there is absolutely no chemistry between them.
Now that I've seen "A Walk Among the Tombstones", I'll say that I didn't see much different from the other action flicks in which the former Qui-Gon Jinn has starred in the past few years, so I don't recommend the movie.I wonder if Liam Neeson will ever appear in a serious movie again..
The movie started really good, the beginning and the drama was OK but the only thing I think it was not logical is about all the time we spend watching lian neson talk with the little boy.I like the acting but in this case don't expect Mr. neeson to trouw the guys or shutting (you won't see this) Very slow movie, drama is not that bad but I think they spend too much time doing a lot of things but trying to find the guys that committed the crime.in a few word, is a BAD movieDon't recommend the movie.
"A Walk among the Tombstones" is either a welcome step away from Liam Neesons action hero stasis, or a disappointing misstep into quieter movies.
More than it would if Neeson was just out to kick some bad guys butts again.Though it will almost definitely disappoint those wanting more "Taken" style fighting/car chases, as a Slower paced thriller it has an intriguing, thoughtful plot, and plenty of dark atmosphere, instead of forced, fast action.
Once the movie started it clearly went another direction, and gave off more of a vibe, like that of the movie "Ransom" starring Mel Gibson.Liam Neesons performance was very solid as it often is, not nearly as much action as his roles usually produce, but much stronger and brought to light dialogue.
Based on terms of quality it is among the same leagues, linking both darkness to intensity, resulting in a rather thrilling film.'A Walk Among The Tombstones' follows former NYC cop and private investigator Matthew Scudder, portrayed by Liam Neeson, who is hired by drug dealer Dan Stevens to find his kidnapped wife.
In fact, if you mix Gone Baby Gone and Taken together then you would probably get this movie, it is entertaining, and even has a phone call moment like Taken, however not as iconic (or as cool).Based on the Matthew Scudder books (That Liam Neeson admitted to not even reading), a character formerly played by Jeff Bridges in the 1980's and that Harrison Ford was attached to for a long while before taken over by Neeson.
Scudder is an interesting character with quite a deep past, which mixed with work of Academy-Award nominee Scott Frank at the helm of director and screenplay creates something admirable.Starring Liam Neeson as the lead, he now adds yet another exceptional character to his portfolio of sixty-three feature films.
'A Walk Among the Tombstones' is little bit more than usual Liam Neeson action flick.
He gets hired by a wealthy drug dealer to find the scum who kidnapped, raped, tortured and murdered his wife, and as he investigates he discovers that she isn't the only one who's fallen victim to the killers - they've been targeting the wives, girlfriends and daughters of wealthy drug dealers - and in the end the movie focuses on the desperate search for a 14-year old girl who's been taken by them.This movie is dark and suspenseful, and Scudder is a dark, troubled and gritty character.
At this point Liam Neeson had cemented himself as our new action hero superstar who proved that beating the air out of bad guys never gets old, if you do it right of course.'A Walk Among the Tombstones' takes our beloved actor down a different path this time with the character of Scudder (Neeson), an ex-cop who clearly has the weight of the past bearing down on him.
Yes, it is an R rated for strong violence, disturbing images, language and brief nudity – not mentioning the dismemberment of human bodies – but the actors are so excellent and the director's sense of pacing and of what to show and what to suggest that the overall impression the film leaves is one of horror – but brilliance.Matt Scudder Liam Neeson) is a former cop now a private eye.
Although comparisons with titles like "Se7en" couldn't be made here, this is very nice mystery thriller, a sort of departure from the recent action flicks for Liam Neeson, although not very far departure at all.Liam Neeson stars a private detective who once was a cop and after some tragic incident (you know does that usually happens at the begging of the movie - the one that makes our hero lose the badge) he turns to a private detective without the license.
Effective mystery; grim, murky, short on action and plot twists, but long on tension and atmosphere.Straightforward story wisely gives Neeson more to do than stomp villains into the ground, as he reluctantly finds those responsible for the kidnap and murder of a drug dealer's wife.
For some reason people tend to associate Neeson with films like Taken rather than Schindler's List, forgetting that the man is a good actor before being an action star.
A Walk Among the Tombstones veers from the action toward the psychological thriller, making better use of Liam Neeson the actor and avoiding pointless gun fight scenes and base emotion revenge killings.
The main character is an ex-cop going to AA meetings after a personal drama; the investigation is nothing special, just basic techniques, dumb luck and some skill; the killers are psychopaths, but no Se7enesque geniuses; the mood is dark, but nothing like The Dark Knight, it is just ugly reality; people are getting beaten up and killed and there is no one to righteously avenge them.Bottom line: a sort of slow paced thriller focusing on characters rather than action or some ingenious plot, it must have disappointed legions of Taken fans, but it is ultimately making a much better use of Liam Neeson, the actor..
Despite having a run-of-the-mill story, A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES has some of best character work that Liam Neeson has done in a long time.
In this film Liam Neeson plays Matt Scudder, a former cop turned unlicensed private detective.
The end product is an awkwardly paced, but ultimately absorbing thriller, filled with gruesome violence and unsavory characters.Neeson plays Matt Scudder, a former NYC cop now working as a non-licensed private investigator.
In production since 2002, A Walk Among the Tombstones is the stylish film adaptation of Lawrence Block's gritty novel of the same name.A Walk Among the Tombstones is the tale of ex-NYPD officer turned private investigator Matthew Scudder, played by Liam Neeson , hired to find out who kidnapped and murdered a drug dealer's wife.The film and screenplay by Scott Frank is adapted from the long running Scudder novel series by Lawrence Block.
Liam Neeson plays Matt Scudder, ex cop, ex alcoholic now an unlicensed private eye.A drug dealer's (Dan Stevens) wife gets kidnapped and even though a ransom was paid she was brutally killed.
A Walk Among the Tombstones (2014) begins simply, as a detective yarn in which Matt Scudder (Liam Neesen) reluctantly tracks down the kidnapped wife of drug dealer Kenny (Dan Stevens).
This is somewhat different, it is a thriller, not an action film, but I had the feeling that the angry Irishman would be there at some point :)It is a good film, Liam Neeson is not way of his hardcore revenge element, but his character has more depth and personality then some of the others.
Yet it's not Liam Neeson's reliably good performance which makes this film what it is but it is the excellent script and direction that makes 'Tombstones' one of the most tightly wound thrillers you will ever see.
At times the film is much more reminiscent to Neeson's work in The Grey than what he has done lately, but despite the strong performance, the main character of A Walk Among the Tombstones is the city which has been manipulated by Frank to appear gloomy and dark.
I tend to enjoy Liam Neeson in all of his films so I really don't complain when I go see one of his mind numbing action flicks like Taken because I have a good time with it.