3 Days to Kill (***)
Directed
by: McG
Starring:
Kevin Costner, Amber Heard, Hailee Steinfeld, Connie Nielsen, Richard Sammel,
Eriq Ebouaney, Tómas Lemarquis,
Seen:
May 4th 2014
***
Out of ****
From
the mould of Taken, writer-producer Luc Besson (of such movies as Leon: The
Professional, The Fifth Element, the Transporter series, and more) brings us
yet another entertaining French-American action thriller. This time it’s with
director McG (the Charlie’s Angels movies and This Means War among others), and
while the movie features some impressive action set-pieces and a merciless
Kevin Costner, it blends this with some family drama and comedy that is enjoyable
but at times a little awkward. To top it all off, Amber Heard’s character is seemingly
exported straight out of a science fiction movie a la Aeon Flux, given her
character’s dress sense and personality. The movie received mostly negative
reviews in the States, but I found it pretty entertaining, an interesting 117
minute diversion.
Ethan
Renner (Costner) is an exceptionally experienced CIA hit man, and the movie
starts with a sting operation in which he and a team attempt to capture the
Albino (Lemarquis) to try to get to his boss, the arms dealer known only as the
Wolf (Sammel). They hit a snag when the Albino recognises one of the team’s
agents and kills her, and chaos erupts as they escape. Renner cripples the
Albino, but cannot capture him as he passes out after a bad coughing bout. When
Renner comes to he is in a hospital bed being told that he has mere months left
to live with brain cancer having spread to his lungs. This motivates him to
leave the CIA and attempt to fix his relationship with both his wife Christine
(Nielsen) and his daughter Zoey (Steinfeld), whom he has badly neglected over
the years. He promises Christine that he is done with his old life, but is approached
by the mysterious CIA assassin Vivi (Heard), who realised that Renner might
have inadvertently seen the Wolf and may be able to identify him again. She
offers Renner an experimental drug in exchange for his services as a brutally
efficient killer, and Renner tries to juggle the ‘contract’ with repairing his
family and keeping it from his wife, everything building up to a climactic
battle between Renner and the Wolf’s men.
The
scenes between Renner and Zoey are touching and effective as the father and
daughter rediscover each other, and Renner has some great opportunities to
protect her while botching some others to try to win her trust. Hailee
Steinfeld is a very talented young actress and she more than stands her ground
with Kevin Costner and Connie Nielsen, who both deliver believable and
relatable characters. This family story is augmented with yet another family
story: when Renner arrives at his Paris home after some time away he has
squatters living in his apartment, causing some awkward laughs and interesting
situations as he brings prisoners and/or witnesses to the apartment during his hunt
for the Wolf.
3
Days to Kill provides some sleek action sequences (one in which the viewer is
asked to believe that a small Peugeot/Renault can keep up with a large Audi…)
and some oddly comical interludes. The story barely makes up for the odd
mixture of awkward drama and spy violence as well as a sci-fi temptress. I
enjoyed it though, and might, just for the heck of it, and to have more Taken-like
movies on my shelf, get the DVD one day. If you’re looking for a spy-action
movie, 3 Days to Kill delivers an entertaining if somewhat oddly jumbled
package.
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