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Year: 2019
Rating: R
Running Time: 1 hour, 58 minutes
After his son is murdered, a snowplow driver goes on a quest for revenge against the people responsible for his son's death.
Though this is a story that shows a lack of character development and has no real character arcs, as well as a few narrative threads that seem pointless by movie's end, it would be hard for us to deny that we were at least moderately entertained by the spectacle of violence found in "Cold Pursuit." Watching Liam Neeson go on a killing rampage is pretty fun. We do have to admit that we were disappointed in the lack of "Mr. Plow" jokes. We do hope this is the last action movie for him, though, because he looks tired and a bit over it by now.
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| "I'm just a guy who keeps a strip of civilization open through the wilderness for people." (Image Source) |
"Liam Neeson starring as an old tough guy indiscriminately slaying criminals" has become a common theme within his films. One could even call it a genre in and of itself now. Many times, this premise has failed, but more often than not, we know we're in for an entertaining ride from them. Neeson's latest geriatric revenge thriller is "Cold Pursuit" (2019), which is directed by Hans Petter Moland and is a remake of the Norwegian film "Kraftidioten" (2014), which was also directed by Moland. The screenplay for this American remake is written by Frank Baldwin and serves as his first feature writing credit. It tells the story of snowplow driver Nels Coxman (Neeson), who was recently named Citizen of the Year for his small resort town of Kehoe, Colorado. When Nels' son Kyle (Micheál Richardson) is murdered, this otherwise quiet, average man goes on a quest for revenge against the criminals who killed his kid. Nels' actions ignite a war between two big Colorado drug dealers, Trevor 'Viking' Calcote (Tom Bateman) and Native American kingpin White Bull (Tom Jackson).
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| "You have no clue who you're messing with, pal." (Image Source) |
Unlike many of Liam Neeson's other "senior-shoot-'em-up" action movie characters, Nels Coxman does not have "a very particular set of skills," well, none beyond being a regular ol' hunter like many of the others in his rural community. Despite this, Coxman delivers a helluva lot of beatdowns and extracts information from many people within a criminal organization with relative ease and near-exact precision. It's safe to say he takes to murder like a duck to water. This fact alone makes "Cold Pursuit" an outrageous and over-the-top film that will require a certain suspension of disbelief. It also has an unexpected darkly comedy element that runs throughout the film, though it does start a bit late and can be a bit jarring once it begins. Some of these comedic moments hit their mark and frankly cracked us up, but a couple of the "running gags" about slow-moving lifts didn't really work for us and overstay their welcome. It's sometimes hard to tell if what is happening is meant to be intentionally or unintentionally goofy. We tend to believe most of these poorly timed jokes, the cringey dialogue, the dry, stiff delivery (usually from Tom Bateman), and/or the absurd kill-shots are deliberate. We fully acknowledge these more humorous elements may set a tone that won't be well received by all viewers.
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| "I don't know what igloo you crawled out of, but I think it's best if you crawl back in." (Image Source) |
BigJ's Rating: 6/10
IMDB's Rating: 6.2/10
RT Rating: 69%
Do we recommend this movie: Sure, why not?
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