Taken 3 (2014)

Taken 3 (2014)

After racking up a daunting body count in both France ("Taken") and Turkey ("Taken 2"), the destructive Mills family (who really should consider going into the witness protection program, not only for their own safety, but for ours) turn their sights on the sunny freeways of their home town, Los Angeles, in "Taken 3". Starting with the unimaginative (and, as it happens, incorrect) title, "Taken 3," directed by Oliver Megaton, is both lazy and tremendously overwrought. Anchored, as always, by a sincere performance by Liam Neeson, as well as the additional gravitas provided by Forest Whitaker as the police officer tracking Neeson down, the film pulses with indifference. "Taken" and "Taken 2" were preposterous, but entertaining: care had been given to the plot as well as the filming so that they worked as thrillers. Many didn't care for the sequel, but I liked it a lot, especially the cinematic use of the architecture in Istanbul, which showed a real understanding for how action happening in a very specific landscape can be exciting and suspenseful. "Taken 3" doesn't want to take the time to set things up carefully or clearly, so that while you can perceive that you are on the highway out to Malibu, or careening along the 405, the film doesn't use the specific landscape or architecture to help tell its story. It's just a frantic, flash-cutting frenzy. Even the slower, more intimate family scenes feature so many swooping-up-from-below shots and so many sudden inserts that moments (emotional or physical) are never given a chance to land.