About fifteen minutes into "Taken" I turned to my girlfriend and said "This movie gets an F minus".

I imagine Taken's writing team did their research on the partying habits of 17-19 year old girls at a nursing home. This might explain why the plot involves two teenage girls going to Europe to follow U2. U2, really? According to the American Journal of Scientific Analysis of Teenage Girl Listening Habits, there are currently three high school girls in America who give a fuck about U2 so the idea that two of them were even able to find each other is quite hard to swallow. The writers also decided (after shooing that neighbor boy off the lawn again) that after finally getting away from their parents, the teen ladies of Taken celebrate by inviting strangers to the house, turning the music up to 11 and jumping on the furniture. Oh, and did I mention that the 17 year-old LOST HER SHIT when she got a pony for her birthday? Yeah...a fucking pony. Hey Hollywood, I have an idea. If you want to make a movie with teenagers in it, hire someone who might have been an actual teenager at some point in their life. However, is wasn't until I watched a vengeful Liam Neeson's attempt to blend in on the streets of Paris by carrying around a huge bag of french bread that I was ready to give up.

Oh, but I'm so glad I stuck with it. Let me pull my pretentious head out of my ass for a second to say that I loved this movie. Yes, the first 20 minutes or so are shit. But Liam Neeson as a throat-chopping, steel-nerved hardass is truly inspired. In fact, Neeson is such a force in this movie that at times you truly feel sorry for the bad guys. There are no James Bondesque criminal masterminds detailing the intricacies of their plot. No windy monologues at gunpoint. No deadly-as-they-are-beautiful love interests. In fact, once the action starts rolling (and after the aforementioned hideous first act) there isn't really any filler at all. Just Liam Neeson, hellbent on getting his daughter back from eurotrash assholes who want to drug her and put her virgin ass to work on the street corner.

Great film? No. Worth seeing? Absolutely.
Blake