STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning
Jim (Liam Neeson) is a former Marine, who's recently laid his wife to rest, and whose ranch is about to be foreclosed on by the bank, unless he comes up with a considerable sum of money. As if his life couldn't get complicated enough, he crosses paths with Miguel (Jacob Perez), a young Mexican boy who's fled across the border with his mother, from the drug cartels, led by Mauricio (Juan Pablo Raba) who want them dead. After Miguel's mother meets a tragic end, Jim finds himself taking the boy on an erratic cross country trip to get to safety, while rediscovering himself in the process.
Liam Neeson is now a certifiable action star. It's hard now to recollect a time when he was ever known as a versatile performer, able to lend his talents to a wide array of different roles and genres. From Taken onwards, he has re-invented himself in this new persona, and there's no going back. It's simply now a case of whether each entry into his action CV will be a good or bad one, and The Marksman, while far from without it's flaws, is certainly a cut above the average.
Neeson's Jim has a fairly standard set up for an action hero, the widower who's fallen on hard times. "It's hard to figure out how a guy can follow the rules all his life, and still come falling down" (words to that effect) as he muses at the beginning. It compliments this with the equally standard gets-suddenly-plunged-in to-inexplicable-situation plot line, throwing some typically improbable plot devices and generic, one-dimensional villains in to the mix for good measure. What sets it a cut above the average action caper, however, is the deft little touches of depth and nuance that develop between man and boy on their road trip, that gives it an added human touch, such as Jim with sudden cruelty, crushing the boy's belief in Heaven after suffering a personal tragedy (which he later clears up with him) or a more casual discussion, about things like hot dogs in Chicago!
At heart, it's still just what it says on the tin, a Liam Neeson action movie, but thankfully it's a cut above the average, with a bit more too it than just the standard fair. ***
Jim (Liam Neeson) is a former Marine, who's recently laid his wife to rest, and whose ranch is about to be foreclosed on by the bank, unless he comes up with a considerable sum of money. As if his life couldn't get complicated enough, he crosses paths with Miguel (Jacob Perez), a young Mexican boy who's fled across the border with his mother, from the drug cartels, led by Mauricio (Juan Pablo Raba) who want them dead. After Miguel's mother meets a tragic end, Jim finds himself taking the boy on an erratic cross country trip to get to safety, while rediscovering himself in the process.
Liam Neeson is now a certifiable action star. It's hard now to recollect a time when he was ever known as a versatile performer, able to lend his talents to a wide array of different roles and genres. From Taken onwards, he has re-invented himself in this new persona, and there's no going back. It's simply now a case of whether each entry into his action CV will be a good or bad one, and The Marksman, while far from without it's flaws, is certainly a cut above the average.
Neeson's Jim has a fairly standard set up for an action hero, the widower who's fallen on hard times. "It's hard to figure out how a guy can follow the rules all his life, and still come falling down" (words to that effect) as he muses at the beginning. It compliments this with the equally standard gets-suddenly-plunged-in to-inexplicable-situation plot line, throwing some typically improbable plot devices and generic, one-dimensional villains in to the mix for good measure. What sets it a cut above the average action caper, however, is the deft little touches of depth and nuance that develop between man and boy on their road trip, that gives it an added human touch, such as Jim with sudden cruelty, crushing the boy's belief in Heaven after suffering a personal tragedy (which he later clears up with him) or a more casual discussion, about things like hot dogs in Chicago!
At heart, it's still just what it says on the tin, a Liam Neeson action movie, but thankfully it's a cut above the average, with a bit more too it than just the standard fair. ***