Run All Night - Movie Review

Who's In It?

Ed Harris, Vincent D'Onofrio, Joel Kinnaman and Liam Neeson



What's It About? 

When ex-gang hitman Jimmy Conlon has to kill his old boss/friend Shaun's son who threatens to kill his own estranged son, Jimmy must kill his way through the whole gang in one night to save his son and his family.

Any Good? 

For a film that opens with Liam Neeson's character losing sleep over his killing days, it seems quick to abandon the idea that killing is wrong and effects people as soon as Neeson gets a gun. The closest thing we have to remind us that he does regret his murders is that he refuses to let his son shoot a gun - other than that it's just another shooter.

For a film that seemed to abandon it's whole opening concept - it seems a bit more close to what would really happen to an aging hitman having to go on a murder spree. Neeson's character is pretty slow in fights and gets a bating several times, he reloads his six shot revolver fairly frequently, and he even can barely run - but this is probably the only believable part.

Liam Neeson is pretty good as Jimmy Conlon, he plays the awkward reappearing father well in the scenes where he can just talk to Mike (his son), asking questions about family and work only to be shot down immediately by Joel Kinnaman, who acted equally as well as the son. 

Ed Harris was great as the mob boss, giving a stern warning to his gangster son about allowing heroin into his part of the city through a story about how he watched his friends rot away to cocaine, and is menacing when he learns of his sons death and warns Jimmy that he will kill Mike to even the scores.

I thought Run All Night was a mess. It didn't know what it wanted to be - a narrative showing the effects killing have on a person, or just another film Liam Neeson can kill people in. Really, really odd direction choices plague it too, you can go from an actors face to a top down moving view of the city to a shot of a cars wheel from beside it - and that's one of the opening and not-so-weird-shots.

I don't know if I've been spoiled by John Wick, but I really don't recommend seeing this, Taken is a lot better for more the same thing.

Rating: