Thursday, September 08, 2011

Unknown


The plot of the movie UNKNOWN is like something out of a Cornell Woolrich pulp yarn:  a guy gets in a car accident, spends four days in a coma, then wakes up and finds out that he has no identification, his wife claims she never saw him before and says she's really married to some other guy with the same name, and nobody believes our hero's story. To make things worse, he's in a strange city, and mysterious assassins are trying to kill him. Paranoia abounds.

Well, there are a lot more complications before everything gets straightened out, and to be honest, this is one of those movies where I was never sure if the plot completely made sense. But if you don't think about it too hard, UNKNOWN is fairly suspenseful and entertaining. I saw a lot of the twists coming, but not all of them. Liam Neeson has become a fairly effective, if a little bit stodgy, action hero, and the chases and fight scenes in this one are well-staged, so you can tell what's happening most of the time. That's pretty refreshing in this day and age. This isn't a great movie, but it's an enjoyable one.

8 comments:

Adventuresfantastic said...

That definitely sounds like Woolrich. I'll have to check this one out.

Cullen Gallagher said...

I wanted to see this because I really liked Liam Neeson in TAKEN, and this seemed to be similar in tone.

Jack Badelaire said...

After watching the trailer a couple of times I had figured out the "twist" before seeing the film, but I was pleasantly surprised when I finally saw it, even when my guess was vindicated. Liam Neeson is able to do that "you have no idea how effing lethal I can be" shtick very well.

Anonymous said...

A really tired plot.

pattinase (abbott) said...

I liked it too. Although January Jones is not my favorite actress.

Prashant C. Trikannad said...

I'm going to have to see this one. I liked Liam Neeson in TAKEN too, as well as in SCHINDLER'S LIST and K-19: THE WIDOWMAKER; the latter alongside Harrison Ford.

Anonymous said...

It was watchable but definitely no TAKEN. I agree with Patti, January Jones was awful (though as always nice to look at).

Jeff M.

Unknown said...

I just watched this last week. Not terrible at all. Although, I found January Jones to be absolutely atrocious. Every scene she was in got taken down a notch.