Hello friends! So today I'm going to review a movie that's been out for a while but I had never seen it until recently, The Commuter. This movie stars Liam Neeson doing what Liam Neeson does best, saving the world. If you like Taken or any other recent Liam Neeson movie, then you'll most likely enjoy this one. I wasn't a particular fan of this movie but it is a good movie if you just want to veg out on the couch for a bit and watch a good ol' action movie. But once again I'm getting ahead of myself so... LET THE FUN BEGIN.
PLOT:
So this movie is about an everyday commuter named Michael MacCauley played by... you guessed it, Liam Neeson. He's does the same daily routine; take the train, go to work, meet up with his friend for a drink, take the train back home. One fateful day when he goes to work, he gets fired on the brink of him sending his kid off to college and just a few short years from retirement. He packs up his things and gets back on his daily train, the train he has taken every single day for several years.
On the train he is approached by a mysterious woman who offers him a strange proposition. She offers him $100,000 to do a task for her. She tells him there is a person who doesn't belong on the train with a bag that is a danger to the others. If he can locate them and put a tracker on their bag, the money is his. If he's not able to perform this task, his family will suffer the consequences. What transpires is an action packed ride where he doesn't know who he can trust or if he can even trust himself.
REVIEW:
So as I said before, I wasn't a huge fan of this movie. It felt like Taken or Non Stop, two other Liam Neeson movies where he has to be the hero in order to save his threatened family. I didn't really care what happened to him as a character because his character was never really established. We just got a glimpse of who he was and what his life was like and we're automatically supposed to be connected with him. The first two minutes of the movie is a montage of his life with his family. It shows their daily routines, their interactions, their relationships. This montage went so quickly and was so choppy, the audience never really connected to the family. It was cut so weird, I was often confused as to what was even happening and by the time I had figured it out, it had moved on to another sequence of scenes. This montage had a big impact on the rest of the film because it was supposed to help the audience get connected to Liam's character and his family and what he was fighting for. Like I said it went so quickly and we hardly spent any time with the character, we don't really care what happens to Michael (Liam's character) or his family because we never connect with them.
Vera Farmiga is in this film as the mysterious lady who offers Michael the money and the task. She was only in this movie for maybe like 10 minutes in total. It seemed like such a waste of her talent because she's a great actress and we hardly got to see her. When we did see her it was just of her rambling about her being a psychologist and offering him this proposition and then poof she's gone. I mean she's Norma Bates for crying out loud, the lady can act so use her.
Like I said before this movie just felt like a slightly different variation of Taken. It was similar to another movie of his called Non Stop which was just Taken on a plane. This time around it's Taken on a train (hey that rhymed). It went through the same motions, everyone thinks Liam's character is crazy because he's doing all these "dangerous" things and acting suspicious. Then after one frantic, rambled speech they all believe him and start to fight with him to figure the problem out. It felt like I was watching the same movie just in a different setting and with some different characters.
Don't get me wrong, I love Liam Neeson and think he's a fantastic actor. It just seems like he's been caught in this loop of doing the same type of thing. Much like Jason Statham who seems to only do action movies with similar plots. Liam has made some fantastic movies such as Schindler's List, A Monster Calls, Love Actually, Les Miserables (not the Anne Hathaway version... look it up, it's so good), heck even The Grey was an awesome movie. Let's get him back to those type of roles, the meatier roles where he can really show his acting chops because he has them. I love him as an action hero but when he plays it time after time, it gets a little stale.
Overall this film wasn't my favorite but if you want a movie that you don't really have to think about and just want to enjoy the ride (pun intended because it's a train movie) then this is that movie. It's a fun action movie where Liam Neeson gets to kick some booty. If you want a movie with a bit more substance or a plot that doesn't seem similar to some of his other work, you may want to avoid this one. It just depends on the type of person you are and the type of movies you like. There's no shame in loving these types of movies, you do you.
PARENTS GUIDE:
This film is rated PG-13 so again decide if you'd like your kiddos to watch it. There is some language but not much. There's little to no blood which is nice if you're a squeamish person. There is some violence which is to be expected in this type of movie but nothing too graphic. Other than that there's not too much.
CONCLUSION:
I hope you enjoyed this review and all my other ones as well. I'm having a blast writing them and I hope you're having as much fun reading them. Please leave me a comment or suggestion so I know if anyone is actually reading these besides my parents. I'm still going to write them even if it is just my parents (Hi Mom! Hi Dad!). Anyway please share with your friends and feel free to leave me any movie suggestions you'd like me check out! Until next time...
In case you're wondering why I posted this gif here... it's just to let you know that this is what me and my sisters will be like in old age. Enjoy.
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