HC Reviews

Man On Fire

Denzel Washington .... Creasy
Dakota Fanning .... Pita
Marc Anthony .... Samuel
Radha Mitchell .... Lisa
Christopher Walken .... Rayburn
Giancarlo Giannini .... Manzano
Rachel Ticotin .... Mariana
Mickey Rourke .... Jordan


The story:
An ex-military man, disillusioned by his job and driven to drink, takes a job as a bodyguard to a young girl. He bonds with the young girl and, when she is kidnapped and allegedly killed, swears vengence on anyone who was involved or in any way profited from her kidnapping and alleged death.

Acting: EXCELLENT!!!
Denzel brings so much emotion out of this character. I found myself getting sad when he was sad, happy when he was happy, pissed off when he was pissed off. I was even rooting for him when he was killing everyone left and right.
Dakota Fanning got me all invested in her character, so much so that I was freaking out when she got kidnapped. I predict good things for her in the future, provided she doesn't fall into the child actor traps of either getting not so cute when she gets older, losing her money, or getting into drugs/alcohol.
Christopher Walken can do no wrong in my eyes. He had a very small part in this film but his performance was great. But then again, I have that unnatural obsession with him. Even if this had turned out to be a crappy movie, I would still love him.
Hell, even Marc Anthony gave a great performance.

Directing/Editing: Amazing.
Tony Scott doesn't insult the viewer's intelligence by putting in "rib shots" (poke you in the rib clues to see if you get the plot). Instead, he lets the story tell itself and leads you and the characters to the conclusion together.

The only nitpick I have is that it took FOREVER to get to the end once Denzel's character decided to go kill everyone. And at 2:25, this was already a long movie.
I highly recommend this movie. Posted by xinh at September 17, 2004 05:59 PM