Retribution: Movie Review

Cast: Liam Neeson, Matthew Modine, Embeth Davidtz, Noma Dumezweni
Director: Nimrod Antal

Yet another nail in the acting coffin of Liam Neeson, Retribution's rip-off of the Keanu Reeves' thriller Speed is an exercise in absurdity and terrible execution.

Neeson stars as Matt Turner, an absentee father despite always being present, whose day goes from bad to worse after the hedge fund he works for collapses dramatically overnight. Asked to help out at home for once and take the kids to school, Turner finds things even further complicated when an unknown caller tells him there's a bomb in his car and gives him a set of instructions to follow.

As the clock ticks, Turner tries to work out who's behind it, and get out safely.

What should be a tense and taut affair becomes a laughable exercise in stretching a storyline as far as it can go as well as throwing in as many domestic contrivances as is possible. 

While the visuals are largely confined to the car and tight close ups of Neeson and the anguished kids, there are moments the story becomes a wider affair and makes use of a series of nondescript locales around Germany to showcase a side of the urban sprawl rarely seen on camera.

But it's the risible dialogue and the laughable twists that really cripple Retribution from soaring where it could. One twist is so obviously signposted it ruins the whole affair.

And in the middle of it all is Neeson, an actor who seems determined to trash every decent film ever entered into his catalogue. With a series of late career action films that have largely unchallenged the ageing actor or which call on him to lazily deploy his Taken-style range of acting, Neeson turns in nothing original here and thanks to the script, nothing with any kind of depth.

There are moments when Retribution makes use of its premise and ups the tension. A late in the piece sequence involving the police shows signs of what could have been, with suspense and interactions that move the story on and engage the audience.

Unfortunately, they're too few and far in between - and the only Retribution in this bomb of a film is the one the audience will be seeking to inflict on all involved having sat through it.