Unknown

Unknown

           Unknown is a classic suspense thriller.  Unfortunately, what makes it classic is that it is filled with all those clichés that at one time were interesting, but after having seen them recycled innumerous times you can’t get past that necessary ‘suspension of disbelief’ that it takes to lose yourself in a film.

            I will say that I find Liam Neeson one of the most dependable and classic actors in films.  He can play all types of roles and always delivers.  And, despite my misgivings about this film, he delivers the solid performance he was hired for. He plays the traumatized Dr. Martin Harris, an American physician whose wife accompanies him on a bio-technology conference in Berlin.  Upon checking into a hotel, Dr Harris realizes he left a briefcase at the airport.  In the cab ride back to the airport, a horrible accident puts him into a coma from which he wakes up four days later.  He finds that despite imperfect recall of who he is and his life, no one else knows him…including his wife.  He finds that another man (Adian Quinn) has stepped into his life as Dr. Martin Harris.  No one, including his wife and friends, realize he is who he says.  He sets out to remember what happened and how his life was taken from him.

            This film is one of those twist and turn plot movies where as soon as we figure out what is happening another curve ball is thrown.  It was done in formulaic fashion.  I don’t think this next comment is a plot spoiler as I think you can derive this from the trailer, but this is a conspiracy movie.  I guess what kept going through my mind in every scene was how impossible the conspiracy was.  So many precise events had to happen in an exact Machiavellian sequence that it would be impossible for anyone or any agency to plot that exactly.  Any small variable or variance would cause the whole plan to collapse.  Then there were the DaVinci style trail of clues and secret codes he had to crack to lead himself to the truth.  The leaps he makes in logic were improbable at best.  Somehow, after a traumatic head injury, he figures out that a series of numbers in the back of a book he possessed really spelled out something in Latin which he deduced was a passcode to a computer file.  That is some Mensa level deduction. 

            Then of course the clichés:  Amnesia, something everyone who gets in an accident comes down with. The cab driver who rescues him is an impossibly beautiful illegal immigrant (Diane Kruger, remember her as the German starlet in ‘Inglorious Basterds?) named Gina.  Aren’t all illegal immigrant cab drivers runway models? They didn’t even try to frump her up.  She was stunning.  Then somehow Dr. Harris is a Daytona 500 level driver as he goes through lengthy car chases in a city he has never been in.  I have to tell you, that every time I go five miles over the speed limit in a construction zone, I get pulled over.  Apparently, in Germany, it’s possible to have extended car chases that destroys property, causes numerous car pile-ups, and demolishes infrastructure and public transportation and not a siren is heard.  The cliché that really caught my attention is when he was looking for a name in a phone book at a phone booth.  He finds the name and tears out the page.  This may not seem like a big deal to people my age or older, but when was the last time you saw a phone booth let alone a phone book in a phone booth?  The phone book page tear is so 1990’s and before. 

            Despite all my complaints, this was a good popcorn movie.  It’s like getting a favorite meal at a chain restaurant.  You enjoy it, but you’re not going to call anyone up and say; “You won’t believe the ‘Italian Pasta Trio’ I had at The Olive Garden tonight”.  Frank Langella, much like Liam Neeson, always brings a level of class and credibility to any movie.  January Jones, as Liam’s wife, delivers a solid, if uninspired, performance as his confused and conflicted wife. 

            Maybe I’m jaded because I’ve seen so many movies, but there was nothing that I haven’t seen before.  If you have an afternoon to kill and there is nothing else on, it will make a good matinee.  Otherwise, wait for the DVD.

I rate this: **