From Paris With Love

Jeri Jacquin, Movie Maven

Opening in theatres this week from director Pierre Morel and writer Luc Besson along with Warner Bros. Pictures/Europa is an action filled look at “From Paris With Love”.

This film tells the story of James Reece (Jonthan Rhys-Meyers), a young employee of the US Ambassador in Paris whose side job is working a low-level CIA operative. Living a good life with his girlfriend Caroline (Kasnia Smutniak), James wants a little more action.

The CIA obliges by giving him partner Charlie Wax (John Travolta), an agent with unorthodox loose cannon ways sent to do a job – stop a terrorist attack.  From the moment Wax steps off the plane, James is on the run. Through the streets of Paris to the dirty underworld he begins to rethink his desire for more excitement.

As the tables begin to turn and it is James who becomes the target and Wax may be the only person able to keep him alive and stop an impending attack.

FINAL WORD: Travolta as Wax is hysterical and straight-forward. Watching this character come on screen with no pretense was fun. Wax came to do a job and he did it with no excuses. So I would have to say it looked like Travolta was having a lot of fun.

Rhys-Meyers is perfect in the role of a young man wanting more excitement in his job. I can imagine it was a ride to keep up with his partner on screen. It is quite a different character than he’s use to taking time from his role as King Henry VIII in the cable series “The Tudors”.

Smutniak put in a good performance as girlfriend Caroline.

Luc Besson is best known for his film “La Femme Nikita” and the cult classic from 1997 with “The Fifth Element”. He also brought the “Transporter” films to screen. In 2008, his film “Taken” gave Liam Neeson coolness status in the action film genre.

Other cast include: Richard Durden as Ambassador Bennington, M. Yong as Yin Bing, Amber Rose Revah as Nicole, Chems Dahmani as Rashid and Eric Gordon as the Foreign Minister.

TUBS OF POPCORN: I give “From Paris With Love” three tubs of popcorn out of five. This is a film that is filled with action mixed in with wit and charm. This is just a fun time film and a no-brainer. Coming in at 92 minutes it goes from bang to bullets and wastes no time.

In the end – it’s two agents, one city and no merci!