Saw it today. If you liked Taken with Neeson that came out in 2008, you’ll like Unknown as well. Where Taken was set in Paris, Unknown is set in Berlin.
Unknown is a classic action mystery thriller. I could have sworn after seeing the movie it was from the same writer or director. But after looking up the credits the only common theme is Neeson.
The stories are not even similar, just the pacing and the action scenes. Don’t get me wrong, this movie is not going to win any awards, but if you want just good movie fun that will keep you guessing, find your favorite theater with good popcorn and you’ll enjoy a couple of hours of entertaining fun.
We saw it last night; as you said, not an award-winner, for sure. But we both (hubby and I) like Liam Neeson, and I am also a big fan of Frank Langella!
My biggest complaint about the whole thing would be that, towards the climax, when you think things should really start cooking along, the pacing sloooooowwwwwws dowwwwwwnnnnn. This is the point where, in a really good action/thriller, it would be moving like a freight train with the brake disabled. Instead, I was left sitting there thinking “OK, OK, now we know the secret, can we just get on with it?”
I saw it last night and enjoyed it too. I thought it was unpredictable and liked how it all played out. I’m not one of those who likes to try and be more clever than the movie by figuring stuff out in advance, then sitting there with my arms mentally folded going “Well? WELL?” impatient for the movie to hurry up and get to the point where I can see if I’m right, then when the time comes I can think to myself “HA! See?” and later crow on message boards about how I was so very clever and act distainful toward the movie for not being more clever than I was, which makes the movie an inferior product and worthy of scorn with its only positive attribute being a vehicle in which I can display my cleverness, distain, and superior intellect to friends, co-workers, and those on various message boards.
I don’t do that. If I pay for a movie I want to get my money’s worth, take in all the scenes and process them as they happen and not try to jump too far ahead which distracts me from what’s going on at that moment.
I would have had a pretty good popcorn movie night last night if I’d stuck with this and Cedar Rapids. A funny comedy and a good action thriller, both worth my time and money. Unfortunate I added the profoundly stupid and horrible (IMO of course, YMMV) I Am Number Four to the mix. If there’s a choice, choose Neeson.
I know she’s been around for a while, but I’d never seen January Jones in anything. She reminds me of a young Bridget Fonda.
I’m on my Touch because my computer is on the fritz, so it’s hard to lookup names and provide links, but I forgot to add that one of the reasons I wanted to see it right away is that I quite enjoyed the director’s previous film, Orphan, with Peter Sarsgaard and Vera Farmiga. I’m glad to see him jump into the big time in such an assured manner, and I hope this does well for him so he can do more personal good movies and get to the point where I can remember his name without having to go look it up.
Back from IMDB Ah, his name is Jaume Collet-Serra and he’s a Spanish director. He went from House of Wax, which I didn’t see, to Orphan with a couple of leading names in Independent film, to Unknown with much bigger-names. He’s so a director to keep an eye on (and remember the spelling of his name, if not how to pronounce it).
It was also great to see Bruno Ganz in this. Some will remember him as the main Angel in Wim Wender’s Wings of Desire. Others will know him from playing Hitler in the film Downfall, even if you’ve only seen the parodies.
Just got out of the show, and I really enjoyed it. I just want to be entertained at the movies - I don’t want to be educated, I don’t want my consciousness raised (as the horrible 60s and 70s psychobabble would put it). I just want to enjoy myself. And I did. There was one part at the end that made me laugh, though. Since I never get the spoiler box to work I will leave it at that.
We saw it yesterday.
Having lived in Berlin, it was interesting to see many of the location shots. It was filmed mostly in what used to be East Berlin, with interiors shot in the film studio Babelsberg.
Nice to see the “old neighborhoods” where I used to hang out when I lived there.
This is the Berlin that I know - unlike the Berlin many think of who have never been there. A very metropolitan city; no beer halls or Dirndls or yodeling or any of the other German cliches. The interiors of the apartments (taxi driver’s and private investigator’s) were spot on for realism.
The plot was fairly decent, if not all that original. Kept our interest, moved at a good clip and had a satisfying ending.
As mentioned, this will not be nominated for any Oscars, but was certainly an entertaining popcorn film.
Oh, I’ll bet there’s a beer hall somewhere in the city. I really liked the location, and it’s interesting to get your take on it. About the ending,
I thought it was interesting that even though you come to find out that Harris is an absolutely dispicable man, a monster, you’re rooting for him to get away with the girl. Would we have felt the same if Harris had been played by an unknown actor?
We’re supposed to assume that he became a changed man, that even after he got his memory back (in the midst of the fight with Adian Quinn’s character, Harris-B) he could’ve killed his taxi-driver character, but he didn’t.
I understand that. [spoiler]He had changed, profoundly. The accident and coma changed his brain chemistry/makeup/whatever to turn him into a decent human being, the kind of human being we would expect Liam Neeson to be. Then we come to find out that before the accident, he was the worst kind of terrorist, willing to murder a noble and generous research scientist (not to mention his twin daughters and all the other people at the party and anyone else in the vicinity in the way of projectile objects) for what? Not for religious or idiological reasons. For money. I feel like spitting just thinking of what he was. I felt dirty hoping he’d get away, while a part of me hoped he’d get killed at the very very end.
Yes, he’d changed, but he still deserved prison or death for what he was before. Jesus may forgive, but the law and humanity doesn’t and shouldn’t, not in this case. But it’s Liam Neeson man! He’s got to get away with the girl![/spoiler]
The only reason I saw this one was because of how much I liked Taken, but this was shit.
The phrase should be “if you liked Taken and would really like to see The Bourne Identity remade but with bonus boredom then you’ll like Unknown.”
January Jones is awful. Diane Kruger only slightly so. Neeson was ok, but I kind of expected him to fall alseep on screen from boredom with his character. Redo the movie from Bruno Ganz’s point of view and then they’d have something.
I enjoyed it. I had a profoundly shitty week at work, and I was in the mood to watch a really good popcorn flick, which this was.
The plot may not have been profoundly original in retrospect, but I didn’t foresee any of the plot twists coming as I was watching it.
More than one hole in the plot, and some of the dialogue was just moronic, but Liam Neeson was good, Diane Kruger was good, it was great seeing the guy from The Lives of Others as the scientist, and it was nice to have my opinion that January Jones has nothing going for her but her looks reinforced.
The more I see of January Jones in other roles and interviews, the more I’m convinced she’s not acting at all. The woman has no personality. It works for Betty Draper; it makes near everything else dreadful.
The whole “I’m really an impostor but I think I’m the real guy” schtick has really been done to death, IMHO.
Don’t get me wrong, I like a good come-along-for-the-ride movie as much as anyone, I just didn’t find this exciting or engaging.
Also, what’s the deal with January Jones helping Liam at the end? She says she loves him, making us think that they have some secret forbidden assassin-affair going, but she’s still evil and nothing is resolved regarding this plot point. If Liam did have a relationship with her, it’s completely forgotten by the next scene. She doesn’t play into his motivation at all, except inasmuch as he wants to stop the assassination.
[mod hat on]friedo, remember to use spoiler boxes on plot twists, please.
[mod hat off] As far as what January Jones did at the end,
[spoiler]if you mean go back to unhook the bomb, she didn’t do it to help Liam Neeson, she did it because she didn’t want to be connected to a failed assassination attempt.
I will admit I did laugh when she blew up though. [/spoiler]
she was trying to tie up the loose end of the missing briefcase at the airport, and Head Honcho said as much by thanking Liam for getting the briefcase for them…that it was “untidy” to have left it. In the art exhibit, she figured out how to play him, and told him he needed to get the briefcase.