Review of Abduction (2011) by Mackenzie H — 01 Jul 2012

Just when action movies keep getting better and better... along comes this film to nearly ruin what they've done. This is a horribly executed mess whose blame doesn't entirely fall on Taylor Lautner's shoulders (as much as anyone wants to blame him) only because not even the smallest thing could have salvaged it.

Jacob -- I mean, some other kid -- gets this feeling that something's not right about his life. After realizing that he's been adopted (or taken), the logical step may have been for the sinister elements to come into place for an eerie "Twilight Zone"-like episode, but... No! Instead, it just craps on everything and puts Jacob on the run because there's this big international plot to kill him while he must figure out who he is and--.

Pfft! It was dead on arrival. I wasn't expecting very much out of it, considering it was an action movie with Taylor Lautner of all people... but I never expected it would be this bad. Considering that Sharkboy's in the lead role, that makes this movie close to impossible to even take seriously. The supporting cast is also wooden and stiff, with the rare exception of Sigourney Weaver. Not only that, but there's also the distressing matter that it's awful on a technical standard, with direction, editing, choreography, and camerawork shoddily done. All this and a nonsensical story which shamelessly borrows from "North by Northwest", "Bourne Identity" and other wronged-man flicks? Great.

The only redeeming quality in this is that just about anything can be made fun of. Extremely laughable action scenes abound, the train sequence is a real hoot! And Pittsburgh at least doesn't look like a craphole...

All in all, "Abduction" would be the worst action flick in recent memory, were it not for its redeeming qualities. That doesn't discount it from still being just a bad, bad movie.