Taken 2

When the thriller Taken came out four years ago, star Liam Neeson wasn’t quite believable as Bryan Miller, an ass-kicking ex-CIA operative who goes ballistic when some Albanian terrorists kidnap his daughter. Now 60, Neeson struggles even more in Taken 2, a sequel that finds Bryan attempting to reunite with his ex-wife Lenore (Famke Janssen) and daughter Kim (Maggie Grace). When the two show up in Istanbul to hang with their dad after he finishes a security detail, the aforementioned Albanian thugs quickly kidnap him and Lenore. Director Olivier Megaton (Transporter 3, Colombiana) doesn’t do much to distinguish this film from a slew of like-minded one man-against-a-team-of -thugs films. And Neeson really struggles with some of the fist-fighting scenes and appears to hobble his way through several of the chase scenes. While The Expendables films can at least self-consciously poke fun of itself, Taken 2 takes itself far too seriously.