Genre: Drama/Thriller
Related Titles: Taken, Death Wish, The Commuter, Unknown
By Leanne Harragan
Snowplow driver, Nels Coxman has his lift turned upside down when his son dies. His search for the truth behind his death sets off a chain of events that take him from honorary citizen into a merciless vigilante.
Cold Pursuit is a attempted mix of thriller and comedy, the thriller aspect works fine but the comedy is a strange addition. The comedic aspect felt a little out of place and fell flat at times. The plot is nothing especially original, when Nels Coxman's son is murdered he begins to hunt down anyone connected to his death. These vengeance movies are pretty common and Cold Pursuit ticks a lot of boxes that are common in this genre.
There's nothing particularly special about this film and it's safe to say that it's pretty forgettable. Liam Neeson plays main character Nels and is citizen of the year, great at his job, all the usual perfect character traits. When his son is connected to a drug crime gang he goes on a mad killing spree, taking one man out at a time till he reaches the top man. The plot is fine, there are some great kills and some good tension created.
Neeson is type cast in this role, as it's pretty similar to every other film you've ever seen him in, Taken, The Commuter, Unknown, he always plays the usual, tough guy that you wouldn't expect to be tough who turns into a bad-ass. Luckily this film was given the rating of 15, this allowed for their to be a bit more violence, some of the deaths were great, I particularly liked the wedding dress shop murder, the bloody death really popped against the backdrop of the white dresses.
One thing that I really didn't like about this film was the way women were portrayed. Not so much the female characters that were in the film because they were strong characters, Emmy Rossum played tough newbie cop who was a solid character until she was reduced to nothing more than a sexual object in return . However, the way that women were spoken about constantly was so uncomfortable, they were literally always referred to in a sexual manner or used as sexual objects. This kind of sucks because it wasn't necessary and I just think it's lazy writing.
It's not the worst thriller I've seen, there was some good decent but I kind of knew where this film was going from the moment it set off. I didn't really like the ending, nothing was neatly tied off leaving it kind of hanging with him driving off into the sunset. An average ending to an average film.
Rating: 6/10
By Rebecca Mannick
Liam Neeson once again is in a suitably average role as he plays avenging father to his sons death. He was murdered by a drug gang as he worked in the airport to a Colorado ski resort town and helped supply the field with drugs. He was caught up and taken care of as 'another problem'. Coxman (Neeson) 'citizen of the year' spent his life snow ploughing a vital road to the community. Once the death of his son sunk in he was on a rampage to seek revenge and find out who was responsible.
The sequencing of the movie was quite good in the sense it was kind of split into parts. The segments were determined by who Coxman was targeting next. The story would shift onto this person until they were killed. The movie gives an insight into the drug world and how their are different crews distributing in different areas. Coxman eventually, accidentally creates a war between two crew who had harmony for a long time while making his way to the drug lord.
To be honest the story was not super original and these kind of murder/drug/action movies are produced quite regularly now. Cold Pursuit was also advertised also as a tongue and cheek comedy as well - which it definitely was not. While the setting looked cold and there were many a pursuit however the simplicity of the story and the un-interesting characters did not take the film to the next level. I do commend director Hans Petter Moland on his first Hollywood job as there were a few inspired shots and imagery. I enjoyed the watch but would not bother again with it.
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