Review of 3 Days to Kill (2014) by Liam C — 22 Jun 2014

For a movie I had been looking forward to for awhile just for the sheer fact that it has Costner in an action role again, I have to say I was quite satisfied with the results. Not to sound rude but when I found out who the director was I just cowered with my head in my hands and just said 'oh no' in a defeatist tone.

But after waiting for half a year I didn't care anymore and just watched it, I was going to watch it regardless of who was behind the camera but day 1 when this was released; I was there. And like I said, I was quite satisfied.

Its interesting enough for two hours and you get a lot for your money with this one, when I found out it was two hours I was pretty surprised, I thought it would have been a cut and dry 90 minutes and the thing is, I wanted more! 2 hours is a very good length, it zipped by very quickly and I could have done with more, for one because I was enjoying myself but also because some things were just absent from the movie and I'll get into those later.

The movie had some very good musical sections, the opening was interesting and unique as was a few others and they were interesting to see. Kevin Costner gave a very earnest performance, it was clear he was having a good time and enjoying it, so I enjoyed watching him perform.

Amber Heard was good and her hair should win an Oscar, damn! Hailee Steinfeld was good also but this is Costners show and carries everything and he does a good job. I was thinking to myself that this had some original concepts in the movie and yes, it does.

The family subplot and the other subplot feel a little different, I can't recall seeing these kind of scenarios in any other film of this type and it was interesting to see played out. The humor here was very, very good.

It didn't feel like that tacked on one-liner kind of comedy that crops up in action movies and one discussion about facial hair was a highlight and while there was a fair few good comedy pieces, I felt like there could have been more and I started to think of my own to fit the scenarios! The ringtone gag never failed to make me laugh.

The cinematography and visuals were very well done also and everything looked beautiful and we are treated to some very nice shots of France too. I only have a couple of complaints, one of them petty and one of them not and just a little irk.

After one of many action scenes leading into a car chase, I noticed a lack in police. I know its supposed to be a high octane action film and police would just drag everything down, so I am glad that they did not show up but its just funny to me how they're nowhere to be seen-ever.

The other complaint is much more movie breaking for some people; clearly. I personally thought the family conflict was finely handled for a movie like this, while it certainly isn't Oscar-worthy, for an action film it was pretty well handled, there's another subplot and while I won't get into that for spoiler reasons, it really does feel out of place, forced in and doesn't have any sort of conclusion at all, it just sort of fizzles out and expects you to just except what happened.

Also, some big dialogue scenes are just absent. A scene where Costner explains what he does to someone? Doesn't happen. Seems like a pretty big thing to miss out oh but wait! Its referenced that he did indeed talk about this but we never see it.

.. Right... Hopefully this will be addressed in the extended edition or even in some deleted scenes- it isn't a movie breaker to me and this part in particular doesn't even rear its head until the final few minutes, so I guess its not all bad.

The audio here, at least at the start, seemed weird it felt like everything was recorded in an empty room that had an echo... It was just weird and something that I haven't encountered before. Do I think it's a bad movie? Not at all.

Could it have been better? Sure. But for what I was expecting and what I got, for two hours, it sure isn't that bad. It wasn't a super deep character study and it didn't need to be. It has its fair share of problems but given how fast it all went by and how much I was enjoying it, I'll give it 4/5 (And its not like Taken, because this is actually good.

).