Taken

Tramping its size 10s in the footsteps of James Bond and Jason Bourne is this highly entertaining – if highly unoriginal – thriller starring Liam Neeson. The Rob Roy star is former CIA man Brian, who’s hung up his badge to devote himself to being a good dad to his teenage daughter (Grace), who has decided that she is now old enough to vacation in Paris with a girlfriend and no parents. But his hopes of bonding with his little gal come a cropper when sex traffickers kidnap his little princess. It’s then up to our action hero to come out of retirement and use every trick in the CIA handbook to track down the bad guys. The result is a fine old school revenge thriller, with Neeson’s portrayal of a desperate dad and some top-notch action scenes making up for a far-fetched, not to mention familiar, storyline. [Kevin McHugh]