Unknown

Jethro's Note: Vance, my co-reviewer from The Social Network, insisted he do the same here. I don't know why.

Vance: What’re you watching?

Jethro: Unknown.

Vance: You don’t know?

Jethro: No, it’s called Unknown. It stars Liam Neeson, and it’s a more preferable title than Hors de Moi ("Out of My Head"), the French Novel by Didier Van Cauwelaert that was used as the basis of this American film by Spanish auteur Jaume Collet-Serra.

Vance: I’ll be going now.

Jethro: Good. Now, here’s the review.

In Unknown, Neeson is Martin Harris, a world class biophysicist married to Elizabeth (January Jones). On a routine conference in Berlin, Martin has just checked into the hotel when he remembered a forgotten briefcase at the airport. On the way there, a flying refrigerator causes a chain reaction that lands his taxi into the Spree River.

Four days later, he gets up from his coma and locates Elizabeth. Yet, she doesn’t know him for some reason, and some other guy (Aidan Quinn) has taken his place. With no identification on him, our hero is nearly convinced he’s crazy. That is, until some bad men try to kill him for some reason. With his only ally Gina (Diane Kruger), the driver of the fateful taxi, our hero sets out to solve the mystery.

The film has many good aspects about it. One of them is the Berlin scenery, photographed by cinematographer Flavio Labino. Another is the spectacular action scenes that happen in Berlin. My favorite is the car chase on the sidewalk, especially since one of the cars was going backwards. These scenes were edited nicely, and made the film well watchable.

As Martin, Neeson perfectly puts the audience in the right spot to question reality along with him. Amongst his supporting cast, the best is the extended cameo by Frank Langella as Martin’s “old friend.” He seems nice, legitimately concerned about his paranoia, up until we see that he’s not a good man. When the truth comes out, one can’t help but feel as surprised as our hero.

It’s the time of year where sub-par blockbusters are churned out by studios waiting for the big guns. This is not one of them; instead, this is an action-adventure that’ll keep its audience interested until the credits start rolling.

Jehtro's Note 2: Yeah, Vance didn't stick around. Guess it shows him I'm the real reviewer on this blog.