Taken (2008)

Director: Pierre Morel

Starring: Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Leland Orser, Jon Gries, David warshofsky, Holly Valance, Famke Janssen

More info: IMDb

Tagline: They took his daughter. He'll take their lives.

Plot: A retired CIA agent travels across Europe and relies on his old skills to save his estranged daughter, who was kidnapped on a trip to Paris to be sold into prostitution.

My rating: Easily 8/10

Will I watch it again? Duh.

HOLY FUCKING SHIT! Liam Neeson is a badass! Once the shit went down a few minutes in this was a fucking blast all the way to the last drop. His character is one of those no-nonsense characters that's fucking great at what he does which is permanently fucking up people's shit. There's no flinching and there's not a wasted moment. He knows what to do and he does it. I love characters like that. Like Mal from FIREFLY (2002). He's got no problem killing someone before they give some bullshit speech to negotiate. The action scenes are tight even if a little jittery (but not enough to piss me off). It'd be nice if they didn't resort to that style of filming but it could be a metric shit ton worse. The kills are great. Watch the unrated international version if you have a choice. It's brutal. I see there's a sequel due to come out this year. I'm not sure how I feel about it but if they can maintain the badassness of the first then I'm on board.