Movie Review – Taken 2

In Taken 2, Liam Neeson’s character is taken hostage.. Sigh. Did these kidnappers not watch the first film.. will they never learn?

The Plot:

“Liam Neeson returns in Taken 2 as Bryan Mills, the retired CIA agent with a particular set of skills who stopped at nothing to save his daughter Kim from Albanian kidnappers. When the father of one of the kidnappers swears revenge, and takes Bryan and his wife hostage during their family vacation in Istanbul, Bryan enlists Kim to help them escape, and uses the same advanced level of special forces tactics to get his family to safety and systematically take out the kidnappers one by one.”

And this time they seem to have the likes of his fiesty daughter Kim ( a chip off the old block) to contend with as well.

Well, in Taken 2, Liam Neeson who reprises his role as the retired CIA operative, is always a pleasure to watch. How he keeps so fit and trim, is a mystery but this guy keeps getting better with age. Neeson plays the concerned parent Bryan Mills while Maggie Grace and Famke Janssen re-enlist as his daughter Kim and ex-wife Lenore respectively. In Taken 2, the story is more about the villain ( the father of the guy Mills killed in the previous installment) coming back to wreck revenge on Mills family. Writers Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen (who also scripted Taken) reference the earlier movie in an opening hill-top burial scene where Albanian clan chief Murad Krasniqi (Rade Sherbedgia) vows to avenge Mills’ killing of his son, the head of a human trafficking ring who one tried to kidnap Kim.

So the story unfolds in Taken 2- Mills on assignment, invites Kim and Lenore to spend some holiday time with him in Istanbul. One car-chase later, and it’s Mills’ and Lenore’s turn to be “taken,” while Kim has to use her wits and her father’s directions on the phone (similar to the earlier movie in the “stay calm and hide” vein), to avoid being captured.

Mills, who has secreted a micro cellphone about his person, manages to contact Kim and teleguide her actions, organising their escape by remote control. Practicing his superpowers of escapism, he is able to break free of his bonds and save Lenore before she bleeds to death. There is nothing that Mills cannot do – he is the king of martial arts, of using firearms and he is a father a husband and all in one!

OK, so did I like the show? Yes, for the entertainment factor, for sure. But it was pretty far fetched in certain instances that things panned out the way they did. The timing was always impeccably in Mill’s favour and the villains never stood a chance from the very beginning of the show.

Neeson is utterly convincing as the anger-fueled but soft-spoken action hero, the personification of the regular guy pushed to the limit to defend his family, and it’s hard to see the Taken franchise succeeding without him. And therein lies the problem, without him, the show is no more than a series of exploding grenades, a central car chase, smashing glass, spinning tyres and sweaty hands grappling with gearsticks, and the rather anti-climactic punch-up in a Turkish bath.

Still, if there is a Taken 3, I will be there to watch it.. for Neeson of course! 😉

Release Date:

IN CINEMAS 4 OCTOBER

Twentieth Century Fox Film

Watch the Trailer: