Spring Break
Luc Besson's thriller 'Taken' fails to take audiences' breath away
by Alex Pagan
Staff Writer
Arts | 1/20/09
Posted online at 10:54 PM EST on 1/19/09
/ Last updated at 6:04 PM EST on 1/19/09
How do you feel about horses? For many, they are majestic creatures; with their flowing manes and supple coats, horses embody poetic form and grace. According to a somewhat dubious source, Liam Neeson once punched a horse in the face and knocked it right out. In metaphorical terms, Taken primarily consists of Liam Neeson punching horses square in the face. The filmmakers take something beautiful and delicate, like the strained relationship between a father and daughter, and from those premises derive a plot based on antiheroic violence, savagery and brute force: Horse-punching in every way.
Neeson's character, Bryan Mills, is a retired spy trying to reestablish his relationship with his daughter, who currently lives with her icy mother (played by Famke Jansson) and her stepfather, a stereotypical, obscenely rich and heartily bearded L.A. exec.
From the outset, Mills is portrayed as neurotic and detail obsessed, while also as a man trying his best to be the better daddy. He purchases (after a period of intensive research) a karaoke machine in an attempt to encourage his daughter's aspirations to become a singer and thereby regain her affection. Well, dontcha know, moments later, the rich stepdad gives her a thoroughbred. Liam Neeson must have been itching to get a swing in. The daughter and one of her affluent friends leave on a trip to Paris under the pretense of cultivating their interest in museums. However, after Mills uses his spy vision to spot an unconcealed travel map of Europe, it is revealed that they're actually following U2 on tour, a distinctly teenage girl-like activity. Ex-spy guy is terror-struck. Paris, of all places? God, no! Well, for all of his paranoia, Neeson was right about one thing: No place is safe, especially from the long arm of the world sex trade. His daughter and her friend are abducted by Albanians, who then render them docile with forced heroin injections and price them for sale. When Mills discovers this, he has a chipper phone conversation (which he records with equipment from his obligatory spy-style attaché case) with the abductors, in which he vows to use his "special set of skills" to hunt down and kill them if they do not release his daughter. Mills calls in a favor with his old government buddies, who are able to deduce an implausible amount of information from the recording of the abductors in mere seconds.
Neeson's character, Bryan Mills, is a retired spy trying to reestablish his relationship with his daughter, who currently lives with her icy mother (played by Famke Jansson) and her stepfather, a stereotypical, obscenely rich and heartily bearded L.A. exec.
From the outset, Mills is portrayed as neurotic and detail obsessed, while also as a man trying his best to be the better daddy. He purchases (after a period of intensive research) a karaoke machine in an attempt to encourage his daughter's aspirations to become a singer and thereby regain her affection. Well, dontcha know, moments later, the rich stepdad gives her a thoroughbred. Liam Neeson must have been itching to get a swing in. The daughter and one of her affluent friends leave on a trip to Paris under the pretense of cultivating their interest in museums. However, after Mills uses his spy vision to spot an unconcealed travel map of Europe, it is revealed that they're actually following U2 on tour, a distinctly teenage girl-like activity. Ex-spy guy is terror-struck. Paris, of all places? God, no! Well, for all of his paranoia, Neeson was right about one thing: No place is safe, especially from the long arm of the world sex trade. His daughter and her friend are abducted by Albanians, who then render them docile with forced heroin injections and price them for sale. When Mills discovers this, he has a chipper phone conversation (which he records with equipment from his obligatory spy-style attaché case) with the abductors, in which he vows to use his "special set of skills" to hunt down and kill them if they do not release his daughter. Mills calls in a favor with his old government buddies, who are able to deduce an implausible amount of information from the recording of the abductors in mere seconds.
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