Taken 3 (2014)

Taken 3: Liam Neeson is the king of action movies. He is the ultimate badass. Every action movie I have seen with Liam Neeson, I have enjoyed. Every single film... except Taken 3. Liam Neeson tried but ultimately the movie was terrible. The film suffers from a near non- existent plot that thinks a lot of car chases and explosions is enough to make this movie passable- it was not.

Not often in an action movie do I find myself getting bored, but it happened here. During one of the unmemorable scenes of the car chase, I found myself wondering what Liam Neeson's character Bryan Mills is trying to accomplish here. The answers was nothing. I thought long and hard about it throughout the film and came to the conclusion there was no actual point to the chase. It added nothing to the plot and Bryan Mills could have easily gotten rid of the cops before they even hand-cuffed him because of his "very special set of skills" which he exhibited numerous times throughout the film. Hollywood should know that, although Liam Neeson is awesome in every way, he is not a substitute for a well- throughout plot.

The script was even worse. The dialogue throughout the movie was terrible. None of the lines added any depth to the characters. We already knew the returning characters but the new characters could have been horrendously murdered and the audience wouldn't have really cared because the director didn't give any depth to them. Worst of all Forest Whitaker's character Detective Franck Dotzler was said to be smart numerous times, but the grand conclusion he makes at the end of the film is something the audience figured out in ten seconds. I don't want to give away the big surprise but it has to do with "very tasty bagels."

I honestly felt bad for Liam Neeson during this movie. His acting was as good as it could be, but the script and plot were terrible. He had to carry the movie from the very second it started. I know he had a contract to do the film, but I would have demanded a rewrite if I was him because it was about a thousand times worse than the original Taken. Again, Liam Neeson was still incredible as always and only because of him, watching the movie was not a total waste of time.

This movie might be an entertaining movie to watch on DVD or video on demand. That is a big might though. I do not recommend you see this movie in theaters and you should only watch it if you are having a really boring Sunday afternoon.

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Fmovies: Taken 3 is a step down from Taken 2, itself a lesser film than the original. But that is to be expected and forgiven. The title could be considered an unimaginative misnomer, but it makes marketing sense.

Aside from the part of Stuart (husband to Famke Janssen's Lenore), the casting is consistent. The addition of Forest Whitaker as a smart cop is for me something of a saving grace since Taken 3 offers up absurdities without question. On reflection, however, the plot has enough coherence to do the trilogy justice. Moreover, it is a joy to see Liam Neeson in this role again.

The director Olivier Megaton has an irksome penchant for frenetic, up-close, disorienting action sequences whereby shots are rarely longer than two seconds. He was a little better in this regard for Taken 2, which had the benefit of superior choreography.

Another personal point of contention is the casting of Sam Spruell as the top Russian villain. He has not an imposing physical constitution and quite frankly brings to mind Jim Carrey, who sported the same haircut in the Dumb and Dumber movies. Not at all what I want in a villain.

I generally enjoy the films I see, and this one—notwithstanding the negatives—is no exception. However, I would not recommend it for people who are more stern in matters of taste.

In the beginning, former special forces expert Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) found that his daughter was taken in Paris while, in the sequel, he himself was taken in Istanbul. Clearly Neeson took a bit of persuading to play the role a third time, but it would appear that three factors persuaded him: first, he didn't want to do any travelling this time (so all the shooting -in both senses of the word - is in the overly-familiar Los Angeles where he goes "down the rabbit hole"); second, apparently he didn't think anyone should be taken this time (and the writers obeyed the injunction until near the end when they just couldn't resist any more); and third, he wanted the money.

This is a movie which divides the critics and the public: the former have been very condescending about it but the later enjoy Mills using his special skills again and again (and you can't really blame them). The bad guys here are (mostly) Russians who have terrible accents and awful clothes (especially underwear), but it is always a pleasure to see Forest Whitaker (an intelligent member of the LAPD who knows the significance of a warm bagel). The tag line in the advertisements for "Taken 3" is "It ends here" and I think that would be a sensible decision (although I wouldn't guarantee it).

Taken 3 fmovies. You'd have to be an idiot to trust the opinion of someone who can't review a movie without waffling for 20 minutes. Listen to me; you won't be sorry. This is not a good movie. Taken was pretty good; Taken 2...not so much. This one is just bad; It's just an old guy running around, shooting at stuff. None of the clever stuff from the other 2 movies is here. Nothing that made Taken good is in here. Nothing that made Taken 2 at least recognizable as a Taken movie is here.

If you ignore me and watch it anyway, I will look for you, I will find you...you know the rest. Actually, if you'd sat through this movie, you'd probably welcome the sweet relief. I meant to end this review right after "This movie is bad", but IMDb apparently likes people to waffle, and there is a 10 line minimum.

In Los Angeles, Lenore St. John (Famke Janssen) is murdered with sliced throat in the apartment of her ex-husband Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) and he is accused by the police of murdering her. Detective Franck Dotzler (Forest Whitaker) pursues Bryan while he investigate who might be the killer and protects his daughter Kim (Maggie Grace). Bryan discovers that the Russian gangster Oleg Malankov (Sam Spruell) is the responsible of Lenore's death and together with his team of friends and Lenore's husband Stuart St. John (Dougray Scott), he hunts him down. But why Lenore was killed?

"Taken 3" is a movie with awful camera, edition and direction and senseless plot. The edition is annoying with several cuts, but the plot is ridiculous. When Bryan is arrested at the gas station, no police officer is interested to see the surveillance camera footage. Why should he drug his daughter instead of putting a note in the yogurt scheduling a meeting with her in the toilet? How did he escape from the explosion in the elevator? Oleg's building is surrounded by security system, but a van parks in the parking area and no guard comes to check. Stuart spends lots of time in the van and it is not strange for the security guards. Why Stuart need to flee abducting Kim? Did Bryan's friend die in the van? Bryan causes several accidents on the highway certainly with injured people; destroys a parking building and cars; destroys an airplane; but in the end everything is OK. My vote is four.

Title (Brazil): "Perseguição Implacável 3" ("Implacable Search 3")

One of the worst movie editing I've ever seen in my life for an action movie. That killed the movie for me. I think they should just withdraw Taken 2 and Taken 3 and admit that they should have stopped at the first one.

This movie was so boring, and when you expected to see some action scenes, you were getting yourself in the paranoid mind of a director who wanted to experiment on the poor audience. My eyes still hurt from the crappy editing of this movie.

Guys please stop here, enough, no more Taken sequels. With each one of them you're killing the hype that the first one created.