Will film history repeat itself this month?
Last January, an aging action hero (Liam Neeson) pulled out all the stops to protect his daughter from a kidnapping ring.
“Taken” seemed an unlikely hit, but it made a bushel of cash and vaulted Neeson back into the limelight.
Audiences gobbled up his retired CIA hero, a man using all the tools at his disposal to save his darling daughter. The film’s January release date underlined the lack of confidence in the film – studios often use the month as a dumping ground for commercially questionable features.
Now, another aging action star is about to return to theaters this month with a similarly themed project.
Erstwhile “Lethal Weapon” Mel Gibson is the headliner of “Edge of Darkness” – hitting theaters Jan. 29.
The film follows a former police detective (Gibson) out to solve the mystery of his activist daughter’s death.
One look at the trailer and it’s easy to see the film could attract the same kind of crowds. That’s good news for Gibson, who hasn’t had a hit since the 2002 feature “Signs.”
(Photo: Mel Gibson plays Thomas Craven in Warner Bros. Pictures’ and GK Films’ suspense thriller “Edge of Darkness.” Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures)
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{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Revenge Mel has always been his best character … Payback, Ransom, LW2, Braveheart … should do great business.
I think the whole point of the trailer is to make you think the movie is like Taken, but I suspect a ‘bait and switch’. This is actually a remake of an old British miniseries, and all of those except Traffic flopped hard. I expect it to leave a smoking crater with the remains of Mel Gibson’s acting career at the bottom.
Agreed. This is being marketed as Taken, I’m thinking it’s something else.
Audiences may be ‘Taken’ …
And how odd will it be if there’s a bait and switch? Why not just give audiences what they want in the first place?
If you mean odd as in strange, I agree with you.
If you mean odd as in unusual, it’s pretty much SOP these days.
I take the spots I’ve seen as playing off the tone of Ransom and Payback, which I thought were good entertainment. Ransom actually had some fine chops when it came to tracking the disintegration of Gary Sinise’s cop and his weak and increasingly frightened gang. The real shame is the recent public disintegration of Mr. Gibson’s personal life, which I find difficlt to forget when I watch the spots and trailers. I’ll definitely rent this later in 2010 and try it on our new Sony Bravia!