Movie review: Run All Night
‘Run All Night’ gets its title from the subsequent episodes, as Shawn puts the might of his Irish-American mob, the policemen on his payroll and at least one methodically cold-blooded assassin after Jimmy and his son Michael.
Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra
Starring Liam Neeson, Ed Harris, Joel Kinnaman
Jaume Collet-Serra, who is making a name for himself directing action thrillers, and directing action thrillers starring Neeson, does one better in Run All Night. He has not one but two ageing marksmen who have been friends for more than 30 years, who have so many kills between them that even police have lost count, and who, more interestingly, have now fallen out over things that their sons have done.
Neeson is Jimmy, who works for and is devoted to Harris’s Shawn. Lately though Jimmy has been haunted by the murders of past. When he takes these ghosts to Shawn, the latter assures him they are together in it for life.
Soon though, Shawn’s son Danny is in bad trouble, Neeson’s son Michael (Kinnaman) happens to watch it, and as Danny pulls the trigger on Michael, Jimmy shoots him. Shawn and Jimmy have a heart-warming and quite chilling phone call where Jimmy informs Shawn what has happened, and Shawn tells him what inevitably has to follow.
The movie gets its title from the subsequent episodes, as Shawn puts the might of his Irish-American mob, the policemen on his payroll and at least one methodically cold-blooded assassin after Jimmy and his son Michael.
Collet-Serra captures New York beautifully, in intermittent rain, Christmas lights, and against its trains, even if the frequent zooming out and zooming in become repetitive. He also gives the essence of Jimmy and Shawn’s friendship through just a couple of scenes, helped along by the marvellously worn, grizzled and ruthless Harris and some well-written lines. “It is a hell of a thing to know that you can never make the woman you love happy any more,” says Shawn, when Jimmy asks him to put behind his son’s death.
Run All Night doesn’t do as well with the relationship between Jimmy and Michael, though Kinnaman is efficient enough. Michael resents Jimmy for having “deserted” the family, and this anger, carried well into the end, seems only for effect after a while.
A car chase and a search through an apartment complex teeming with flats and people are the highlights. But, yet again, Collet-Serra doesn’t known when good is good enough. So Run All Night stretches well into next day, and well out of steam.
Source:: Indian Express
