Film: B+
The vigilante film had become a lost art for a while there. So prevalent in the 70’s through the early 90’s they’ve died down a bit when Arnie and Sly began to show their age and action films tried too hard or just not enough. There was something satisfying in Commando or Rambo, that’s rarely been revisited since. The Jason Bourne films steered Hollywood into a new direction, as the thrill of pursuit with high speed action found its place once again, reawakening the James Bond franchise. In comes the movie Taken, a film produced and co-written by fan favorite, Luc Besson, (Le Femme Nikita, The Professional) a guy who knows a thing or two about making films with intrigue, suspense, and action. Together with director, Pierre Morel, and fellow writer Robert Mark Kamen, they craft one of the tightest thrillers in a long time. It’s perfect in its pacing, its situation, and execution. There’s absolutely no fat in Taken, just a simple guy with the means to back up his words.

Retired government operative Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) just wants some normalcy in his life but no one listens. His 17-year old daughter, Kim (Maggie Grace) and friend Amanda deceive him by telling him that they are spending the summer with Amanda’s family. In actuality they are following U2 all around Europe free of any family or supervision. This comes at a time when Mills moved to LA, living in modest conditions to be closer to his daughter to try and repair the relationship he sacrificed while working for the government. Bryan’s ex-wife Lenore (Famke Janssen) has since moved on and is begrudgingly allowing him to see Kim on a limited basis, while rubbing in her new husband’s luxuries.

Kim agrees to check in with her father when she gets to Paris, and when she does, Bryan gets the call no parent ever wants to get. Witnessing Amanda being kidnapped, Kim frantically has some last words with her father knowing that she’ll be next. Instructing her to give him any clues she can, Bryan goes into survival mode and is forced to race the clock: get to Paris, and save his daughter from being a victim of human trafficking. It’s so simple and yet brilliant because it delivers on every note of what a film like this should be.

In a flash, Neeson goes from a can’t win daddy to an ass-kicking vigilante that would make Jack Bauer proud. He’s quite believable while doing it too. With an imposing stature combined with the fast-cutting style of French action cinematography you never get the sense that this guy is retired, as if he was a sharpened tool just waiting to be used. He’s resourceful and is constantly using the skills learned as an operative. Remember when Steven Segal broke onto the scene and in his early films you believed this guy could be a one-man wrecking crew. The problem was, he believed it too, a little too much. But Neeson plays the part to a tee, and we get lost in what he does on screen. We only wish we possessed not only the size, and skill but have the necessary connections to be able to wipe it clean from our record. In the end, it’s the ultimate wish fulfillment film, and the biggest ?I told you so.?

The Director’s Cut places four minutes of violence back in, and the box office success shows why the choices were made but as far as the story goes, those added minutes are important details that bring the desperation and urgency of a one-mission man. Unable to slow the film down to show emotion, Neeson is able to show that in subtle details in how violently he goes for these guys for example shooting for the head and multiple rounds unloaded. It’s enough to get a complete picture of what’s going through Mills’ mind. It’s not essential for the story because it played well enough in the theaters, but it does add another dimension to the main character, and hell, who doesn’t like seeing Qui-Gon Jin fuck people up?

Video: A-
Taken plays in high definition with a 1080p, AVC-encoded transfer in a nice wide 2.40:1 ratio. I absolutely loved how this film looked on blu-ray. In the daytime scenes you felt like you were there, but this film really thrived at night. The hues were lush, glowing in night scenes but never to the point of over-saturation. Skintones had warm amber quality to them, even Paris’ ugly corners looked lovely. Moments like the auction scene were as black as a coal mine, and really added to the seediness of it. Fox put out a very strong high definition transfer that has just enough grain to make you know you’re watching a film, but an abundant amount of detail and color show that Taken on blu-ray is anything but standard.

Audio: A
Taken has a great 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio audio track that has broad dynamic range and plenty of action for all channels of your home theater. Crowd noise like cameras flashing and idol chatter move behind you in the early concert scene when we get a taste of Bryan’s skills. Gunshots ping and patter all around as well. The car chase sequence in the construction site is a great chapter to replay and there’s lots of subwoofer activity. Nothing was mixed too strong or harsh, or too low. All of the different dialects are clear and distinctive blu-ray and is possibly one of my favorites this year as far as sound goes. Also available are a 5.1 Dolby Digital Spanish Track, a 5.1 Dolby Surround French track and subtitles in English Hard of Hearing and Spanish.

Extras: B-
Disc One
Toggling between unrated and theatrical versions can be done from the initial disc load or at anytime during the playback of the season.

Audio Commentary by Director Pierre Morel, Cinematographers Michel Abramowicz, and Michel Julienne this commentary is conducted entirely in French, with subtitles. It’s an entertaining track although it’s a little difficult to pick up who specifically is talking at the time since the voice pitch is so similar amongst the three of them. They crack jokes and talk a lot of the production and the artistic direction, and the shooting style at different points of the film. I just wish they could change the colors of those subtitles to yellow.

Audio Commentary by Writer Robert Mark Kamen talks about working with Morel and Besson, gives some French action film history, and the danger of losing sympathy for the main character, gets you in the mind of Bryan which I really enjoyed almost giving a reading of the novel version of Taken if there was one.

Black Ops Field Manual – is a picture-in-picture is a fun way to watch the film. Black boxes come up in the bottom left with real facts about black operative agents, their training, and some pretty scary statistics of human trafficking. There are just some astonishing facts putting Albania on the frontline of human trafficking offenders. At the top of the screen is a running tab of the distance Bryan travels, the Time Remaining in the story’s timeline that begins when Kim is taken, and a body count of how many people are injured and killed. I happen to watch this while listening to the Kamen commentary, which worked out pretty well.

Le Making Of HD (18:24) – is standard making of affair. Nothing out of the ordinary or particularly special just a bunch of fluff interviews with cast and crew.

Avant Premiere HD (4:48) – a neat split screen interview with Besson, Neeson, and Morel at the premiere of the film in France. As exciting as this event was for the crew who attended, it’s hard not to feel sad though when you see the late Natasha Richardson at Liam’s side.

Inside Action Side-by-Side Comparisons HD (11:05) – Six scenes (Peter Dies, Bryan Escapes Construction Site, Good Luck, The Interrogation, Bryan at Saint Clair’s, and Boat Fight) show how much changes from the on-location shoot to the final result after post production.

Trailers for X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Street Fighter Legend of Chun Li, and 12 Rounds appear when you load the blu-ray and there’s one for Notorious in the special features.

Disc Two:
Digital Copy Disc for laptops, computers and other portable digital media players. It should be noted that it plays the extended cut only.

I’m Quite Taken – Overall Shock Value: B+
Taken is an action-packed 90 minutes that’s been trimmed of all the fat so it should be good for anyone’s diet of films along with those looking for some serious wish fulfillment. The extras don’t push this up another level but it’s a technically sound blu-ray with the trimmings and has multiple ways of viewing it. It’s a great little film that’s easy to get in and then get out, the true mark of a vigilante classic.

Ernie Estrella

Feature: C+

A Spanish-based race of Telmarines have conquered Narnia some 1300 years after the Pevensies left (See the end of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe) and their prince, Caspian’s life is in danger when his corrupt uncle Miraz and his wife give birth to a new son. Having killed his brother, Caspian’s father, Miraz sets his aim on his nephew so that he may be given sole rule over the kingdom but Caspian escapes and sounds the horn that would bring back the Pevensie kids back Narnia who are stuck in our world in England.

Sucked back into the world of Narnia, Peter (William Moseley), Susan (Anna Popplewell), Edmund (Skandar Keynes), and Lucy (Georgie Henley) rescuing them from the mundane human world having spent years tasting the life of a monarchy in Narnia. They regroup in a beach lair and pick up weapons and quickly rescue a dwarf named Trumpkin who was about to be killed by Telmarines. The kids don’t meet Trumpkin’s expectation and reluctantly brings them back into Narnia and explains his disposition. Thought to have been abandoned by the Pevensie kings and queens, Narnians (including the talking animals) fled to hidden corners of the world afraid of the Telmarines, without any leadership to take back what’s rightfully theirs.

On their path, Lucy thinks she sees Aslan (reprised by Liam Neeson’s voice) still having much stronger “faith” than the others. Eventually they meet up with Caspian and a small front of Narnian soldiers who are made up of centaurs, minotaurs, mice, and dwarves who reluctantly entrust the Pevensie’s expecting much older and experienced kings and queens. Peter thinks it’s best to take Miraz at night at his home and argues he knows best.

So they storm Miraz’s castle, only to have been defeated and Peter is now filled with guilt of sacrificing Narnians for nothing on top of abandoning them and a crucial moment takes place. Emotionally and physically spent, they retreat with their depleted forces and leave themselves weak mentally and nearly succumb to the White Witch who makes a grand cameo. Licking their wounds the Pensevies come up with another plan which invites all of Miraz and his men to their home base, Aslan’s burial spot setting up for a messy, convoluted battle that has Aslan coming out of nowhere and tearing the roof off this mother sucker with his massive roar.

There’s much too many battles, duals, and confrontations motivated by impulse for my liking and not enough in between to develop our four protagonists as to why these battles must occur. The Pevensies play out the same roles we saw in first installment and any potential to grow is wasted and so is the interest in either child. Difficulties presented themselves in adapting a screenplay since in C.S. Lewis’ book as Trumpkin tells Caspian’s story for nearly half the book but that’s not the biggest problem or deviation. A fabricated tension between Caspian and Peter (not present in the novel) was forced upon viewers with no real motive but the most interesting aspect of the story for me was the failure, short-sidghtedness and guilt felt by Peter. Everything culminating towards the peak of interest where the White Witch appeared but dashed soon after her exit.

Peter is able to redeem himself in the final dual with Miraz and all seems erased in that large moment for him, along went everything else in the film. Aslan’s easy disposal of the Telmarines is all too convenient and the quick resolution to mop up the mess appears largely negligent as far as I’m concerned. Why would it take you 1300 years to intervene? And now we’re getting religious.

The Christian themes are toned down in this story but they’re still there. The largest is a loss of faith amongst the Pevensies and Narnians in general and how corruption feeds on that letdown. Trumpkin represents that largely, ironic since he’s a dwarf, but if you have faith and persevere, you will be rewarded and it’s Lucy at the end who stands with Aslan. Loyal to the source literature, Peter and Susan find themselves never allowed to enter Narnia again (perhaps because they lost their faith?), Edmund will return with Lucy in the third installment because they still have much to learn and offer to Narnia, but I fear whether they’d be able to hold a film together or if people would care enough to know what happens from here.

Presentation A -

For packaging, Disney used the fatter three disc blu-ray holder and there’s a cardboard embossed-raised slipcase and I dug the menus a lot. The have just enough character with very subtle animation in the far background. A clip of the fine score and a tiny window scrolls through scenes in the film. As you thumb through the menus the run time changes under the title logo with a description of each extra. One typgraphic complaint though, the font used in the main menus is very difficult to read unless you have a big screen TV. It’s a gothic gont, but there are much cleaner old school fonts that would give that same old world feel. The loading screen has Reepicheep swinging his sword, very cute and if you bring up the menu while watching or listening to the commentary, the film shrinks down to the small picture-in-picture — a nice touch! Setup includes Subtitles for the English for the Hearing impared, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, Korean, Taiwan. Bahasa, and Malay.

Audio: B+

Now this is what I call big sound. The 7.1 DTS HD Master Audio is treat for those who may seem a bit underwhelmed by some blu-rays out there. Prince Caspian is very aggressive at the low end. Whether you’re pumping it through five or seven speakers, it will fill the room with an immersive mix of panning effects and constant presence of the score that gets you edging closer to the edge of your seat. But sometimes you’re actually edging closer because you have to strain to pick up the softer dialogue. This is not the best balanced soundtrack. If you turn it up louder for the soft speak, the big actions scenes could blow out some holes in your walls. I found my wife sitting five feet from the center channel just so she could hear everything. There are also 5.1 Dolby Digital tracks available in French, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese and practically any major world language it seems.

VIDEO: A+
The video transfer is phenomenal. Prince Caspian’s escape in the film’s opening is proof of that with lush forest environments, leafs on the ground, and just lot of fine details seen very clearly. It almost feels like Planet Earth because of the big New Zealand landscapes. The CG work looks equally good, the close-ups on the mice reveal many colors in their hair, the level of quality in the costumes is apparent and go to chapter ten to see how deep the blacks can go. This film looks first rate and the 2.40 AVC MPEG-4 transfer is as good as I’ve seen from the Disney library.

Extras: A+

Disc One:

There are two big extras on the first disc, Audio Commentary and Circle Vision Interactive.

The commentary has the four main cast members William Moseley, Anna Popplewell, Skandar Keynes, Georgie Henley, and director, Andrew Adamson. A lot of it is the kids laughing amongst themselves and asking Adamson questions and him answering and lots of back and forth afterwards. It gets a little hairy because sometimes five people are talking over each other so to clearly tell who’s talking when gets to be a bit of a trick. Still, it’s a highly chatty track, which I’m drawn to and is full of good dialogue for fans of the film who want to walk that extra mile.

Next is the massive interactive experience of Circle Vision Interactive: Creating the Castle Raid which is introduced by Adamson (2:01) and are then presented with 10 deeper looks into the highly complex scene. Six of the features are narrated by Producer Mark Johnson, Stunt and Fight Coodinator Allan Poppleton, Visual Effects Supervisor Dean Wright, Special Make-up and Creaters Howard Berger, Andrew Adamson, Costume Designer Isis Mussenden all of which are insightful and exhaustive in breaking down theirs and their team’s personal involvement in the scene. All of them oddly enough have a running time each of 6:49.

The second part of Circle Vision are four interactive maps On the Scaffolds, Gateway Alley, Courtyard Nightshift, Telmarine Casualty allowing you to pan around Miraz’s castle in 360 degrees and are able to explore the minutia of the castle raid through quick facts, brief looks at the animation and CG work done, conceptual work and a handful of five to seven 1-3 minute long vignettes. I discovered that there was an index so you can see everything without having to go through the maps in circles clicking on everything. A massive supplement best taken in bites or else by the end, you’ll get pretty weary of the whole scene.

Sneak Peeks Pinocchio 70th Anniversary Platinum Edition, Earth, and Disney Movie Rewards finish off the extras for the first disc.

Disc Two:

Inside Narnia: The Adventure Returns (34:45) is an on-set experience, revisiting the returning cast and higher expectations of the crew. Adamson is interviewed often. Mild affair, not too deep, but enough for an appetizer for what else is on the disc. Sets of Narnia: A Classic Comes to Life (23:44) is introduce by Doug Gresham (Co-Producer and stepson of C.S. Lewis) who reads excerpts from the book and then shows how that scene came to be. Cathedral Cove in New Zealand as a setting. They even redirected a riverbed to shoot a scene. One of the interesting things about shooting a film is where to shoot it. Producing a movie in the city can present multiple challenges, but filming in the small town of Bovec, Slovenia is a different story. Big Movie Comes to a Small Town (23:13) takes a look at that experience. Missteps, mistakes, outtakes are found on Bloopers of Narnia (3:06) which I always think at most are worth playing once and not much more. Since it’s vogue to make ecological statements, Talking Animals and Walking Trees: The Magical World of Narnia (4:51) is about writing the theme of nature fighting back. Secrets of the Duel (6:48) takes a closer look at the big fight between Peter and Miraz.

The star of the film for me was Peter Dunklage, who I’ll admit is a favorite actor of mine, and watching him run wild with an over-the-top fantasy film made the film more enjoyable to me, so for other fans, check out (4:48) Becoming Trumpkin which does a nice feature on him and going through the body casting process. Get to spend a day on the set with Narnia’s other big little actor, Warwick Davis in the Man behind Nikabrik (11:08) another fantasy veteran. He’s got a charisma about him that’s easy to be caught up into following him around all day. Finally there are ten Deleted Scenes (11:15) with introductions/ explanations for most of which are extended scenes or were cut for redundancy.

Snoop around the second disc for Easter Eggs and look for symbols to appear and you’ll see in the dialogue window, no time or description is shown making it an egg. They’re pretty easy to find compared to what some discs, but so far I’ve found six: (2:25) Blonde Cam, (1:19) Toastie, (1:49) KC Hodenfield First assistnat Director/Co-Producer, (1:00 Monster Cam a first person perspective of being a horse-person, (0:54) Anna Popplewell, (7:46) Shane Rigi Bullgy Bear, Dead Minotaur.

Disc Three
Just your now run-of-the mill digital copy disc.

Overall Shock Value: B-

Technically this is a great disc. From the big sound to the brilliant picture quality this is one of the best looking live action Disney blu-rays to date, and I’m willing to put it side-to-side with other epic fantasies if we’re talking about how good films look and sound in high definition. If we’re talking about content, well that depends on your opinion of the movie. Folks drawn in by the first installment could be let down a bit because those introductory movies are really about discovery and opening the imagination to a brand new world, a viable entry point and way to be held throughout. Prince Caspian is the type of sequel that will probably keep you in the Narnia world for at least another installment or let you off at the next stop. A darker film than The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, with a lot more cynicism and direction setup for lots of large scale action and not a lot of development, but the roots are still deeply buried in family friendly adventure (despite all of the killing). It won’t get carved into the stone tablets of your favorite films and falls well-short of achieving LOTR-lite status, but it’s entertaining enough and gets a first rate treatment in blu-ray.