Taken: The Movie * * * * * * * *

If you like a lot of kick-ass action, you have to like this flick. Someone must have deliberately edited all the gratuitous bullshit out of it, because what was left was a tight 91 minutes of thrilling killing. Of course, a few questions are better off not asked, like “How did Bryan Mills and his daughter, Kim, played by Liam Neeson and Maggie Grace, manage to get out of France, seeing as Daddy was leaving behind a trail of bodies a mile long?” Of course, he managed to stop off at Fake IDs R Us and get some official looking paper. Still, despite a few plausibility problems, I liked this movie a lot more than several others I’ve seen lately, Seven Pounds, for example, which took Will Smith to new levels of stress and anguish. I gave that one a 5, while Taken earns 8 stars.