The Foreigner (2017)
Directed by Martin Campbell
Quan is a humble London businessman whose long-buried past erupts in a revenge-fueled vendetta when the only person left for him to love – his teenage daughter – dies in an Irish Republican Army car bombing. His relentless search to find the terrorists leads to a cat-and-mouse conflict with a British government official whose own past may hold the clues to the identities of the elusive killers.
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What critics compared The Foreigner to
“The Foreigner” starts off as a fairly straightforward revenge film, with echoes of “Death Wish,” “Taken” and even 1992’s “Patriot Games.”
“The Foreigner” begins with a bang, setting itself up as yet another in a seemingly endless line of shameless “Taken” ripoffs (and that’s perfectly fine, because “Taken” is definitely a movie that’s missing Jackie Chan).
Yep, he’s a little bit Liam (coincidentally the name of his adversary here), but you can’t call the movie a full-on rip-off of the Neeson-starring Taken because it’s adapted from a novel published 25 years ago.
I honestly expected a brainless action flick in the vein of Taken .
In the “Taken” movies, it’s just wonderfully ridiculous watching nice, easygoing Liam Neeson turn into a homicidal maniac.
It’s the kind of deeply personal quest for vengeance where a Liam Neeson in Taken mode would come in might handy.
In fact, an extended cat and mouse pursuit in the Irish woods evokes, whether intentionally or not, a similar sequence in First Blood , the first Rambo movie (perhaps at least partly because of the similarity in Irish and Pacific Northwest climates).
Although parts of The Foreigner echo the likes of First Blood and Point Blank/ Payback , there’s more going on here than simple revenge.