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What would life be like if Liam Neeson never uttered the words “I have a very particular set of skills” in the 2008 film “Taken?” Honestly, we don’t ever want to find out.
To celebrate the action hero’s birthday, lets reunion tour with these 12 epic speeches from action movies.
See if your favorites made the list!
HBO’s “Entourage” is headed to the big screen this summer, bringing Vince and his boys and all their Hollywood antics to theaters across the nation. Vince (Adrian Grenier) is making his directorial debut that’s already over budget, Turtle (Jerry Ferrara) is making moves on UFC champ Ronda Rousey, and the other guys are up to, well, whatever it is that they do. Ari Gold (Jeremy Piven) is looking as tan and rich as usual.
Naturally, the trailer is full of booze and boats and partying hard. It’s also jam-packed with stars; Jessica Alba and Pharrell show up, and even Liam Neeson lends a hand… Sort of. Even Mark Wahlberg shows up.
“Entourage” hits the big screen on June 5. [Via Vulture]
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It’s no surprise that “Cinderella” beat “Run All Night” among newcomers this weekend. The Disney live-action fairy tale was widely expected to suck all the oxygen out of the box office, and its estimated $70.1 million debut is in line with predictions.
Still, “Run All Night” seemed like it would be smart counter-programming, drawing older men who wouldn’t be interested in a movie made for young girls. Yet “Run All Night” underperformed even its modest predictions (in the $14 million range), opening instead at just an estimated $11.0 million.
For the third week in a row, then, Hollywood experts will be tearing their hair out, wondering if a formerly sure-fire leading man (Will Smith two weeks ago, Vince Vaughn last week, and now Liam Neeson) has permanently lost his mojo. In each case, despite a recent downward trend, the funeral arrangements seem premature. True, it’s not hard to see why Neeson’s career appears to be in trouble. Nonetheless, “Run All Night” had a particular set of problems that can account for its failure, meaning it’s too soon to write Neeson off just yet.
Here’s what went wrong with “Run All Night.”
The Premise: A world-weary Neeson is forced to pull out his guns to protect his adult child from abductors and killers. Sounds like the “Taken” movies, the most recent of which was in theaters just two months ago. Plus, “Run” was directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, who directed Neeson’s thrillers “Unknown” and “Non-Stop.” So if the action beats seemed familiar, maybe there was a reason.
The Marketing: “Run” is supposed to be a gritty, nocturnal New York City thriller. So why does the trailer show Neeson, in apparent daylight, shooting a rifle in the forest? Is he going after antagonist Ed Harris or hunting Bambi?
The Timing: Speaking of baffling marketing decisions, why was the film’s release date moved from April to March? In April, it would have faced off against the admittedly formidable “Fast & Furious” franchise (“Furious 7” opens April 3), but not much else. Besides, those movies skew younger than Neeson’s do. In March, however, he’s facing off against a saturated market for movies aimed at older guys, from Will Smith’s caper “Focus” to VInce Vaughn’s old-dog-new-tricks comedy “Unfinished Business” to Sean Penn’s similar thriller “The Gunman” (opening next weekend). Not to mention competing against himself; couldn’t the studio have put another month of breathing room between “Taken 3” and “Run”? Hey, maybe these older leading men aren’t having slumps; maybe they’re just having trouble competing against each other (or themselves) for the same audience.
The Reviews: “Run” earned very good word-of-mouth (as indicated by its A- grade at CinemaScore), so those fans who saw it liked it. But critics weren’t as fond; it got a 59 out of 100 score at both Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes. Unfortunately for the film, its target demographic — people old enough to be fans of both Liam Neeson and Ed Harris — still cares what critics say, even more than recommendations from friends.
The ‘Cinderella’ Factor: There was no way the Disney fairy tale wasn’t going to steal the box office thunder of every other movie this weekend. First off, ever since “Alice in Wonderland” five years ago, Disney has perfected a template for releasing lavish live-action fairy tale adaptations in the spring. Second, the title has more built-in familiarity than last year’s “Maleficent,” “Oz the Great and Powerful,” or even “Alice.” Third, the reviews were strong, as was the word-of-mouth (measured by an A grade at CinemaScore). And fourth, the movie had the eagerly anticipated short “Frozen Fever” tacked on, just in case the feature wasn’t a big enough draw for princess-loving little girls and tweens. The movie couldn’t miss, and it didn’t. Even without the benefit of 3D surcharges, it still opened bigger than “Maleficent,” which did have 3D and a better release date (in May) but still came in just a hair behind “Cinderella” with $69.4 million.
Bad Luck: A year ago, Neeson had a sizable hit with “Non-Stop,” which opened at $28.9 million on its way to a $92.2 million domestic gross. Since then, however, he’s had three disappointments in a row: September’s “A Walk Among the Tombstones” (which still opened higher than “Run,” with $12.8 million, though it finished with just $26.3 million), “Taken 3” (which had the misfortune of competing against “American Sniper,” a bigger smash than anyone had anticipated, and which finished with the lowest take of any of the “Taken” movies, and yet which still earned a solid $88.4 million), and now “Run.”
Still, this slump looks worse than it is. “Tombstones” earned another $26.8 million abroad, for a global total of $53.2 million; not bad for an arty thriller that cost a reported $28 million to make. “Taken 3” still earned another $201.1 million overseas, for a worldwide total of $289.5 million. Lots of stars would kill for that kind of disappointment.
Overseas figures aren’t in yet for “Run,” but there’s no reason to assume, if Neeson’s pattern holds true, that the film won’t make at least half its money abroad. Like many leading men, Neeson has a big enough following in the rest of the world to keep the 62-year-old star cracking skulls as long as he wants.%Slideshow-181631%
Liam Neeson has a very particular set of skills – skills that have made him a rather unlikely, but highly successful action movie star in the last decade. He’s faced down kidnappers, an airline terrorist, and even wolves. But now the actor says he’s only got a couple of years left in him to deploy those particular skills.
“I get sent quite a few action-oriented scripts, which is great. I’m not knocking it. It’s very flattering. But there is a limit, of course,” the 62-year-old told reporters while promoting his latest action flick, “Run All Night.”
“For myself, maybe two more years. If God spares me and I’m healthy and stuff. But after that, I’ll stop [the action] I think.”
But who’ll do the saving when someone else gets “Taken”?
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Liam Neeson‘s new thriller “Run All Night” is intense. It’s a nonstop, pulse-pounding rollercoaster pretty much from the get-go, and it doesn’t let up until the credits roll, as we watch Neeson (as a former mafia enforcer nicknamed The Gravedigger by local authorities) try to evade crooked cops, hired killers, and mobsters, over the course of one crazy night. And a big part of gives the movie its white-knuckle excitement, adding to its propulsive, unrelenting drive, is the score by Tom Holkenborg aka Junkie XL.
Holkenberg is a Dutch DJ and musician who has worked closely with Hans Zimmer on a number of scores, including “The Dark Knight Rises,” “Inception,” “Man of Steel,” and “Amazing Spider-Man 2.” On his own he’s scored things like “300: Rise of an Empire” and “Divergent” (he’ll also provide the score for this summer’s hotly anticipated “Mad Max: Fury Road”), plus a whole host of video games.
With his score for “Run All Night,” exemplified by these two tracks, Holkenberg does a nice job of mixing electronic elements with more orchestral motifs to create something that is both wholly modern while also being a classic. The heavy drum elements, too, give you the sense of feet hitting pavement and constant movement, which are two things that are very prevalent in “Run All Night.” The symphonic flourishes are lovely too; Junkie XL might have made a name for himself in the hard-hitting world of electronic music but he certainly knows how to craft a melody, and the mournful second track is a great example of that. “Run All Night” opens March 13th. The soundtrack drops March 10, but you can pre-order it now.
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Seth MacFarlane learned a valuable lesson last year when he unleashed his hugely expensive flop “A Million Ways to Die in the West” last summer: that he should make another “Ted.” And he did. “Ted 2” will be out on June 26th, 2015, and the first rude, crude trailer has just been unleashed on an unsuspecting world (that’s the new poster, just below it).
It’s pretty much everything that you would expect, and not much more. If you’ve seen the original film, about a grown man (played by Mark Wahlberg, who returns here) and his complicated relationship with the talking teddy bear from his childhood named Ted (MacFarlane, with a goopy Boston accent), then you know all you really need to know about “Ted 2,” which sees Amanda Seyfried in place of Mila Kunis, who is also joined by Liam Neeson and Morgan Freeman. Not too shabby.
After watching the trailer, are you ready to make another profane play date with Ted, or have you left it behind, like so many other toys? 
If you’re like us and value your sleep, you probably nodded off into your Ambien dreamland before the party started on post-prime time TV. Don’t worry; we’ve got you covered. Here’s the best of what happened last night on late night.
Goop sings! Gwyneth Paltrow belted out a few show tunes last night on “The Tonight Show” –– but not just any show tunes. She performed Broadway versions of Drake, Big Sean and Niki Minaj, and it was completely amazing –– especially her rendition of “I Don’t F–– With You.”
President Clinton made a pit stop at “Late Night,” where Seth Meyers wasted no time asking if he’d be issuing change of address cards in 2016. His response? “I hope not because 2016 is the election year and I don’t have any place to move.” Way to stay cryptic, Bill. (Note: Mr. President talks about Hilary’s potential run at the beginning of the clip, and the rest features him musing on golf –– just a fair warning.)
Charlie Hebdo released their first issue since being attacked, and Seth Meyers took a turn for the serious by applauding those who went out and supported freedom of expression. Seth also expressed his disappointment in the fact that France arrested 54 people for hate speech. From Seth: “It’s a mistake to believe that free speech means good speech. More often than not it means despicable speech. Defending the speech you believe in is easy, defending real freedom of expression, like anything worth doing, is very hard. It’s never good when a free society is arresting a comedian, no matter how contemptible they might be.”
On a lighter note, Snoop Dogg showed up on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” to debut his Kimmel-only nature show, “Plizzanet Earth,” and it has given us renewed zest for life. Watching Snoop muse on flamingos and say things like “FLAP FLAP” is beyond your wildest dreams, so do yourself a favor and watch.
Liam Neeson also made a quick appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” (sigh, so many celebrity guests, so little time), where he debuted the trailer for “Taken 4.” Not to be confused with actual real-life movie, “Taken 3.” Also “Taken 4” co-stars Jimmy Kimmel and Guillermo, and the preview is fabulous. Kick your day off to an action-packed start by checking it out below.
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When “Taken” was first released, nobody thought that it would lead to anything, much less an insanely lucrative franchise. It was a modestly budgeted thriller ($25 million) that was first released overseas, in France, where its core creative team was from and where the film was mostly set. It starred Liam Neeson, who at the time was not much of a box office draw, and had a grippingly simplistic story, the kind of stuff compulsively readable paperbacks novels are made of. But then it came out and connected with people in a big way, making more then $225 million and leading to a sequel that made even more. In an era when studios are trying to artificially manufacture franchises and entire universes, “Taken” came out of nowhere and lasted much longer than anyone could have guessed.
But just because something is a franchise, doesn’t mean that it necessarily should be one. This weekend’s “Taken 3” makes this lesson explicitly clear.
In “Taken 3” nobody is taken (this was a stipulation Neeson made); instead the genre is refashioned as a “wrong man” thriller, with Neeson’s Bryan Mills on the run from both the police (led by a goateed Forest Whitaker) and assorted Eastern European thugs (they have bad accents, worse haircuts, and prison tattoos), after his ex-wife (Famke Janssen) turns up murdered. Those “particular set of skills” that Neeson famously remarked upon in the first movie are this time utilized to get him out of a number of sticky situations, all while trying to clear his name and bring down the actual killers.
And honestly, as a premise, especially for a franchise as threadbare as “Taken,” this could have been pretty fun. These kinds of movies, whether their Alfred Hitchcock classics or something like Harrison Ford‘s “The Fugitive,” offer a very specific thrill, since as a law abiding citizen it’s uncomfortably easy to place yourself in the shoes of someone who was accused of something they had nothing to do with. The catharsis, of course, comes from the accused overcoming the odds and actually finding a certain level of justice and understanding.
The problem is that the movie is limply directed, once again by “Taken 2” auteur Olivier Megaton, so nothing seems to matter. You would think that the stakes couldn’t be higher, although everything is photographed with the wistful negligence and technical expertise of a daytime soap opera or a commercial for laundry detergent. The propulsive drive of this kind of story simply isn’t there; everything feels slack and lazy.
Most of this isn’t the fault of the performers. Neeson is, yet again, the epitome of composed cool and fierce determination; he’s a hulking physical presence but never brutish, his eyes glitter with fiery intelligence and every movement suggests tightly coiled, barely contained rage. When a police officer mutters that, “This is going to end badly for you,” Neeson blinks and says (in that beautifully gravelly delivery), “Don’t be such a pessimist.” Yes Liam Neeson yes.
It’s just that the script, co-written by series overseer Luc Besson and his writing partner Robert Mark Kamen, gives Neeson (and Whitaker and sweaty series newcomer Dougray Scott, who delivers every line in a weirdly timed, Christopher Walken-esque cadence) precious little to do. Frantic action sequences pop up every once in a while, but Megaton shoots them with little regard for spatial relationships or more generalized geography. So people run into other people and cars crash into other cars, but you can’t tell exactly who is running or crashing into who.. The actors try desperately to add some weight to these sequences, but they’re so joyless and confusing that they barely register as complete scenes. Instead they’re just a series of images that flit by without narrative importance or emotional resonance. (The less said about a clumsy, out-of-left-field subplot involving the unplanned pregnancy of Neeson’s college-aged daughter, played by 31-year-old actress Maggie Grace, the better.)
Honestly, it didn’t have to be this way. Besson is certainly capable of turning trashy material into world-class entertainment (as with last year’s wonderful “Lucy”) and Neeson continues to be one of the most compelling action heroes we’ve seen on screen in years, particularly in his team-ups with filmmakers like Joe Carnahan and Jaume Collet-Serra. But any chance of a celebratory send-off to the “Taken” series (if this is, indeed, that, since the conclusion certainly leaves room for a fourth film down the line) is dashed by “Taken 3’s” utterly lackluster execution.
“Taken” was never envisioned as a franchise and this third film makes it very apparent why. Even a cracking good story, repeated too many times, robs it of its power, even if that story is growled at you by Liam Neeson.
Bottom line: Only Neeson die-hards need apply. This doesn’t do a satisfactory job of wrapping up the franchise or providing much entertainment value at all. Instead, download Neeson’s recent, brilliant, wholly overlooked detective movie “A Walk Among the Tombstones.”
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From humble Irish beginnings to full-fledged Hollywood stardom, Liam Neeson has had a whirlwind career.
Heck, he even reinvented the action hero.
Coming up in the ’80s, Neeson enjoyed moderate success on stage and screen. It was his star turn in a 1992 production of “Anna Christie,” however, that inadvertently catapulted him to fame. After seeing a performance of the Broadway play, Steven Spielberg cast Neeson in his now acclaimed “Schindler’s List” (1993) and made the Irishman a Hollywood leading man. This winter, Neeson is back as another noble ass-kicker in the action movie “Taken 3.”
From his early influences to his own fighting prowess, here are 30 things you probably don’t know about Liam Neeson.
1. Liam John Neeson was born June 7, 1952 in Ballymena, County Antrim, Northern Ireland.
2. His mother was a cook, while his father was a caretaker at a local primary school.
3. Neeson was one of four children, and the only boy.
4. He and his siblings were raised Roman Catholic. Believe it or not, he was even named after the local priest!
5. When he was only 9 years old, Neeson began taking boxing lessons. He eventually became a boxing champion in his province.
6. He had his last fight at 17.
7. Neeson took to the stage at an early age, too. At 11 years old, Neeson accepted his teacher’s offer to be the lead in a school play.
8. Turns out, he only said yes because he had a crush on one of his co-stars.
9. Neeson’s interest in acting was largely influenced by a local minister. “He had a magnificent presence and it was incredible to watch this six foot-plus man just bible-thumping away.”
10. Before deciding to pursue acting professionally, Neeson enrolled in Queen’s University Belfast and studied physics and computer science.
11. After a stint at University, he took up a variety of odd jobs. He even worked at Guinness Brewery for a time as a fork-lift operator.
12. In 1978, Neeson moved to Dublin to focus on acting professionally. The young actor found success on the stage and worked with the Project Arts Centre and the Abbey Theatre (the National Theatre of Ireland).
13. Around the same time, Neeson made his film debut in the religious film “Pilgrim’s Progress” (1978).
14. The Irish actor worked consistently throughout the 1980s, starring in both theater and screen productions. His most notable performances were in “The Bounty” (1984) opposite Mel Gibson and in “The Mission” (1986) opposite Robert De Niro.
15. He even guest-starred in a 1986 episode of the hit series “Miami Vice.”
16. In 1992, Neeson’s career changed forever. After Steven Spielberg saw the actor in “Anna Christie” on Broadway, he cast him in the Holocaust docudrama “Schindler’s List” (1993).
17. The film went on to win the Oscar for Best Picture and also earned Neeson a nomination for Best Actor.
18. To date, Neeson has been nominated for three Golden Globes and one Oscar. He has yet to take home a statue.
19. He was also earned a Tony award nomination for his starring role in “Anna Christie.”
20. One of the most in-demand actors of the ’90s, Neeson was cast in the highly-anticipated “Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace” (1999).
21. Today, the actor has launched a new chapter in his career as an action star with hits such as “Taken” (2008) and “The Grey” (2011).
22. At one point, Neeson was set to play the title role in “Lincoln” and, therefore, reunite with Spielberg. With several production delays, the actor considered himself too old for the part and Daniel Day-Lewis took over.
23. Previously, Day-Lewis and Neeson starred (and fought) opposite one another in Martin Scorsese’s “Gangs of New York” (2002).
24. As for his personal life, Neeson lived with actress Helen Mirren in the early 1980s.
25. They met while filming “Excalibur” (1981).
26. Neeson was later married to actress Natasha Richardson from 1994 to 2009.
27. The two met while co-starring in the 1993 Broadway production of “Anna Christie.”
28. The couple raised two boys together, Micheál (b. 1995) and Daniel (b. 1996).
29. Tragically, Richardson died following a skiing accident in 2009.
30. Bonus Fact: Neeson is the son-in-law of actress Vanessa Redgrave and director Tony Richardson.
This weekend, moviegoers around the country will undoubtedly line up for Liam Neeson in the third (and supposedly final) “Taken” film – and while those moviegoers wait for “Taken 3” will be given an extra jolt of Neeson-related ass-kickery in the form of the new trailer for “Run All Night.” And it’s really, really cool.
In “Run All Night,” Neeson plays a former hit man (his nickname was “The Gravedigger,” so you know he was good) who intervenes when a killer is sent to murder his son (Joel Kinnaman from the “Robocop” reboot). That puts him in the crosshairs not only of his gangland former employer (Ed Harris), as well as a squadron of crooked cops (led by Vincent D’Onofrio). So that’s the incredibly catchy synopsis: one night, Neeson and his estranged son against killers, thugs, and crooked cops. It’s going to be awesome.
“Run All Night” marks the third collaboration between Neeson and his “Unknown” and “Non-Stop” director Jaume Collet-Serra. Their collaborations have always been top-tier entertainment and “Run All Night,” with its delicious premise and hard R-rating, looks like it could be their finest hour yet. Watch the trailer and tell us if you’re ready to “Run All Night.”
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