No, Bryan's not dangerous. The world he lives in is.

Taken 3

(2014)

(SPOILERS) The Taken series’ rep generally seems to be that the first one was good and then Olivier Megaton took over and did for them with his visually dyslexic direction. This is certainly partly true. Megaton’s film grammar is the most incoherent this side of Marc Forster (one wonders why producer Luc Besson, a master of visual storytelling, has repeatedly shown such confidence in him). But the first movie really only has good direction on its side. And Liam Neeson killing bad guys in unrepentant and unreconstituted manner, of course, which can only go so far. As such, Taken 3 is something of a step forward, or at least offers a tentative balancing act. Megaton’s direction remains stupefyingly bad, but there is actually a halfway engaging plot that musters a modicum of interest.

I’m not going to get to carried away praising the picture, mind, since the action is the main draw, and it’s blunderingly inept (there’s a particularly road chase that is downright shocking in its utter lack of correlation between one shot and any other). At another point he manages to drive a car backwards down a lift shaft, for reasons best known to himself. There’s maybe one sequence in which the staging is sufficiently clear to engage (Liam taking out Russians in the drinks section of a convenience store).

Besson and co-writer Robert Mark Kamen had ditched the evil Albanians of the first two movies and gone the reliable route – possibly compulsory, given recent evidence – of making the heavies Russians. They’re well represented by (Brit) Andrew Howard, who had a highly memorable episode in the second season of Banshee (he’s also currently in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., but I’ve given up on that) and (Brit) Sam Spruell.

Underlining that, even if they’re not playing to nationality, British actors are the go-to-baddies to go to, the real villain of the piece is (Brit) Dougray Scott (playing an American, since we know they’re ultimately much more villainous than Russians). While the plot doesn’t mark him out as the bad guy from the start, the recasting of Xander Berkley’s Stuart St John (now married to Famke Janssen’s Leonore, but not for long) is a fairly hefty clue that something is amiss. You don’t cast the iconic villain from Mission: Impossible 2 just to relegate him to the role of the inconspicuous grieving husband.

So this starts from a different place, thankfully. Kim (Maggie Grace, at college and the definition of a mature student) is not kidnapped (well, not until right at the end), and Bryan Mills is framed for the murder of Leonore during the first 10 minutes. It’s a leaf out of The Bourne Supermacy’s book and, as beloved Kimmy is still in the picture, Bryan can continue to dote unwholesomely. Being a superspy, he can dodge the authorities with ease, of course and he even gets a little help from his friends (as before, Leland Orser is the standout).

Making matters all the more digestible is dogged detective Forest Whitaker on Bryan’s trail. Whitaker’s flourishing all the usual Forest Whitaker ticks and quirks, but that’s fine by me. If there’s any movie where that’s welcome, it’s a redundant Taken sequel. And it’s even fine that the beats of his character wanting Bryan to come in while simultaneously admiring his dedication to his craft are entirely rote; again, tolerance levels for that kind of thing come down to the actor (Don Harvey also appears as one of Forest’s men, Snickers from Hudson Hawk, if you’d wondered where he’d got to).

Neeson is as somnambulant as ever, rolling over and surrendering to the absurdity of his character without so much as a glimmer of knowingness (“Inappropriate, huh?” asks Bryan after bringing Kim a giant panda – not a real one – and champagne). So much so that, when a cop advises Bryan “This is going to end badly for you” and Bryan responds “Don’t be such a pessimist” you wonder if Besson and Kamen got their scripts mixed up (they tend to have about a dozen on the go at any one time by the looks of things).

Along the way, Bryan indulges some obligatory waterboarding (because we need to be reminded the practice is totally justifiable as long as you’re a good guy really) and delivers a ream of exposition of how Dougray done it while simultaneously beating the shit out of him. By this point, the picture has outstayed its welcome by a good 20 minutes (Taken 2 at least had the good manners to be short).

I somehow don’t think anyone’s going to be campaigning for the return of Bryan Mills in a few years the way they have for Jason Bourne, although Taken 3 has made more than enough to justify another outing. Neeson would be best advised to leave his taciturn hard man roles for a while, as two a year was at least one too many for anyone to cope with. Megaton shouldn’t be let anywhere near a franchise he can harm (so why not give him Megatron to play with) and Besson’s about to embark on a big sci-fi epic. Hopefully it will be as fun as he can be (The Fifth Element) rather than as pompously deficient as he’s also capable of (Lucy).

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Mondo bizarro. No offence man, but you’re in way over your head.

The X-Files 8.7: Via Negativa I wasn’t as down on the last couple of seasons of The X-Files as most seemed to be. For me, the mythology arc walked off a cliff somewhere around the first movie, with only the occasional glimmer of something worthwhile after that. So the fact that the show was tripping over itself with super soldiers and Mulder’s abduction/his and Scully’s baby (although we all now know it wasn’t, sheesh ), anything to stretch itself beyond breaking point in the vain hope viewers would carry on dangling, didn’t really make much odds. Of course, it finally snapped with the wretched main arc when the show returned, although the writing was truly on the wall with Season 9 finale The Truth . For the most part, though, I found 8 and 9 more watchable than, say 5 or 7. They came up with their fair share of engaging standalones, one of which I remembered to be Via Negativa .

Isn’t it true, it’s easier to be a holy man on the top of a mountain?

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You have done well to keep so much hair, when so many’s after it.

Jeremiah Johnson (1972) (SPOILERS) Hitherto, I was most familiar with Jeremiah Johnson in the form of a popular animated gif of beardy Robert Redford smiling and nodding in slow zoom close up (a moment that is every bit as cheesy in the film as it is in the gif). For whatever reason, I hadn’t mustered the enthusiasm to check out the 1970s’ The Revenant until now (well, beard-wise, at any rate). It’s easy to distinguish the different personalities at work in the movie. The John Milius one – the (mythic) man against the mythic landscape; the likeably accentuated, semi-poetic dialogue – versus the more naturalistic approach favoured by director Sydney Pollack and star Redford. The fusion of the two makes for a very watchable, if undeniably languorous picture. It was evidently an influence on Dances with Wolves in some respects, although that Best Picture Oscar winner is at greater pains to summon a more sensitive portrayal of Native Americans (and thus, perversely, at times a more patr

Schnell, you stinkers! Come on, raus!

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It’s not as if she were a… maniac, a raving thing.

Psycho (1960) (SPOILERS) One of cinema’s most feted and most studied texts, and for good reason. Even if the worthier and more literate psycho movie of that year is Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom . One effectively ended a prolific director’s career and the other made its maker more in demand than ever, even if he too would discover he had peaked with his populist fear flick. Pretty much all the criticism and praise of Psycho is entirely valid. It remains a marvellously effective low-budget shocker, one peppered with superb performances and masterful staging. It’s also fairly rudimentary in tone, character and psychology. But those negative elements remain irrelevant to its overall power.

My Doggett would have called that crazy.

The X-Files 9.4: 4-D I get the impression no one much liked Agent Monica Reyes (Annabeth Gish), but I felt, for all the sub-Counsellor Troi, empath twiddling that dogged her characterisation, she was a mostly positive addition to the series’ last two years (of its main run). Undoubtedly, pairing her with Doggett, in anticipation of Gillian Anderson exiting just as David Duchovny had – you rewatch these seasons and you wonder where her head was at in hanging on – made for aggressively facile gender-swapped conflict positions on any given assignment. And generally, I’d have been more interested in seeing how two individuals sympathetic to the cause – her and Mulder – might have got on. Nevertheless, in an episode like 4-D you get her character, and Doggett’s, at probably their best mutual showing.

You’re a disgrace, sir... Weren’t you at Harrow?

Our Man in Marrakesh aka Bang! Bang! You’re Dead (1966) (SPOILERS) I hadn’t seen this one in more than three decades, and I had in mind that it was a decent spy spoof, well populated with a selection of stalwart British character actors in supporting roles. Well, I had the last bit right. I wasn’t aware this came from the stable of producer Harry Alan Towers, less still of his pedigree, or lack thereof, as a sort of British Roger Corman (he tried his hand at Star Wars with The Shape of Things to Come and Conan the Barbarian with Gor , for example). More legitimately, if you wish to call it that, he was responsible for the Christopher Lee Fu Manchu flicks. Our Man in Marrakesh – riffing overtly on Graham Greene’s Our Man in Havana in title – seems to have in mind the then popular spy genre and its burgeoning spoofs, but it’s unsure which it is; too lightweight to work as a thriller and too light on laughs to elicit a chuckle.

I tell you, it saw me! The hanged man’s asphyx saw me!

The Asphyx (1972) (SPOILERS) There was such a welter of British horror from the mid 60s to mid 70s, even leaving aside the Hammers and Amicuses, that it’s easy to lose track of them in the shuffle. This one, the sole directorial effort of Peter Newbrook (a cameraman for David Lean, then a cinematographer), has a strong premise and a decent cast, but it stumbles somewhat when it comes to taking that premise any place interesting. On the plus side, it largely eschews the grue. On the minus, directing clearly wasn’t Newbrook’s forte, and even aided by industry stalwart cinematographer Freddie Young (also a go-to for Lean), The Aspyhx is stylistically rather flat.

The best thing in the world for the inside of a man or a woman is the outside of a horse.

Marnie (1964) (SPOILERS) Hitch in a creative ditch. If you’ve read my Vertigo review, you’ll know I admired rather than really liked the picture many fete as his greatest work. Marnie is, in many ways, a redux, in the way De Palma kept repeating himself in the early 80s only significantly less delirious and… well, compelling. While Marnie succeeds in commanding the attention fitfully, it’s usually for the wrong reasons. And Hitch, digging his heels in as he strives to fashion a star against public disinterest – he failed to persuade Grace Kelly out of retirement for Marnie Rutland – comes entirely adrift with his leads.

You know what I sometimes wish? I sometimes wish I were ordinary like you. Ordinary and dead like all the others.

Séance on a Wet Afternoon (1964) (SPOILERS) Bryan Forbes’ adaptation of Mark McShane’s 1961’s novel has been much acclaimed. It boasts a distinctive storyline and effective performances from its leads, accompanied by effective black-and-white cinematography from Gerry Turpin and a suitably atmospheric score from John Barry. I’m not sure Forbes makes the most of the material, however, as he underlines Séance on a Wet Afternoon ’s inherently theatrical qualities at the expense of its filmic potential.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

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