Jon22: The Website of Jonathan Dobres

This weekend I saw Taken, in which Liam Neeson plays Batman.  Let me explain.

Batman goes by many names, the Dark Knight and the Caped Crusader being the most familiar.  More rarely, he’s referred to as the World’s Greatest Detective.¹ During the Golden Age of comics, before the Comics Code came along and neutered the medium, Batman’s MO was to apply the full force of his fists and his brains to the criminal underbelly of Gotham, unencumbered by pesky things like due process.  The freaky costume was psychological warfare.  Bruce Wayne reasoned that if you could frighten a criminal on sight then the fight was basically over before it started.

You can blame the Batcomputer for ruining everything.  Batman went from a great detective to a guy in a silly costume who feeds punch cards into a plot device.  Although Batman recovered from this in the 80s, the techno-obsession that wrecked the character continues to this day.  Was the all-seeing surveillance system in The Dark Knight really necessary?  Surely the writers could have gotten Batman to figure out the Joker’s location without resorting to something so creepily Orwellian.

But I digress.  Liam Neeson is Batman.  The trailer would have you believe that Neeson’s character, Brian Mills, used to do some seriously covert government work, and that when his daughter is abducted (as it turns out, by human slave traffickers), he immediately flies into action to retrieve her, ruthlessly beating his way through any obstacle in his path.  For once the trailer is accurate.  True to my wildest dreams, this film is two hours of Liam Neeson systematically tearing apart suckers and fools.  I thought about putting in a disclaimer that billed this as a spoiler-free review, but there’s nothing to spoil.  As the World’s Greatest Detective, Mills moves with ruthless efficiency from one street walker, to the mid-level traffickers, to the high-level traffickers, to the high-level clientele, to his daughter.  As Batman, no one in all of France poses an intellectual or physical threat.  He is a superhero.  Never once does he pause to consider the horrible reality of the modern slave trade, but neither does he hesitate to bludgeon, shoot, and electrocute the scum that makes it run.

The fight choreography is typical for a western film, all quick cuts and brief flashes.  Some would grumble that this doesn’t let you see what’s going on, but it works here.  Mills was trained to break people.  One second you’re guarding the door, the next second Liam Neeson shows up, and the second after that you’re dead.  There’s nothing to show, and I’m fine with it.  Likewise, there are no big explosions (well, except the one), no cartoonish goons, and no grandiose showdown with some crime lord who’s supposed to be the protagonist’s dark equal.  Because, again, Liam Neeson has no equal.  This is not The Transporter.  It’s not even The Bourne Identity.  It’s about this dangerous, dangerous guy pulling out all the stops to get back his daughter, while expending no extraneous effort otherwise.

I have no idea why Neeson would have signed on for this part, but I’m glad he did.  He gives Mills a softspoken, even demeanor that works perfectly with all the killing without coming off contrived.  The few “character” scenes would probably be worthless without him.

Grade:  A.  Do I do grades now?  I guess.

1. In fact, in the landmark Batman: the Animated Series, Ra’s al Ghul would always address Batman as “Detective.” Liam Neeson played Ra’s al Ghul in Batman Begins. Weird, huh? ∧