RANSOM (1996)
A film review by Steve Kong
Copyright 1996 Steve Kong
A few months back I saw the preview for this film. It looked exciting, thrilling, and cool. And I really like Mel Gibson, Rene Russo, and Delroy Lindo. Then I saw that I was directed by Ron Howard, what other great thing could this film have? And this is when the waiting started.
Today, after my physics lab I stood in line for fifteen minutes to buy tickets to the very first showing of Ransom at Century 22 (San Jose, CA). Then sat in a dimly lit theatre waiting for the projectionist to finish up loading the film. Watched three previews (one being Star Trek:First Contact) and then the lights dimmed. Was the film worth the wait? A definite YES!
What a great film. Ron Howard (also known as Opie) does a very good job directing this film, making everything work well together. The well paid Mel Gibson ($20 million) does a great job at being a guy that has fast mood swings and almost seem to care only about himself. Rene Russo looks great, as always, and does great as Mel Gibson's wife. The characterizations in the film were somewhat thin, but the quick pacing of the film moves the audience along so fast that it really doesn't matter.
The plot of the film is about Tom Mullen (Mel Gibson), an airline tycoon, who did one nasty deed in his past. The kidnappers, I won't reveal the identities, take Mullen's kid and ask for a $2 million dollar ransom. We find later, how that nasty deed really fits into the situation.
The film also stars Gary Sinese (Forrest Gump, Apollo 13) as a NYPD detective and Delroy Lindo (Broken Arrow, Get Shorty) as an FBI agent. I really loved Delroy Lindo's performance in this film.
Though we all know how the film is going to turn out, there are enough twists, turns, and surprises throughout the film to keep the audience hooked all the way up to the end. This is a great film. Put it on your "Must-see" list!
Steve
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews