Vengeance: A Love Story

There is not much of anything original or unpredictable going on with this movie. It is pretty much your standard revenge flick, where the bad guys get off in court, and they are dealt with via vigilante justice.

There is one bright spot in the film, though. That is the performance of Talitha Bateman as the daughter. She acts in a relaxed, natural manner that is totally believable. In fact, she shows more acting ability than some of the other characters in the movie. But to be fair, there are a number of caricature roles in the movie that aren't very demanding of the actors (for example, the bad guys and their mother).

Bateman is young, so I hope she can find some better scripts than this in the future, and continues to grow as an actress. At this point, she reminds me of how Saoirse Ronan was at the same age. Ronan developed into a very good actress. I hope Bateman can do the same.

Cage is an enjoyable actor to watch no matter what movie he's in. He plays the strong silent cop here and completely does the job. I've seen him play the recovering addict, the weasel, the flamboyant villain, done it all and each time he makes the roll believable. Don Johnson as usual is fantastic as well. I can't believe how old he is, looks amazing. He plays the high profile sleaze lawyer and he owns the role. All the actors in my opinion perform their roles to a T, unfortunately the movie itself is not great, but it could have been. The directing, or the story, maybe both come off week. The problem is there is no real tension as Cage too easily walks through and obtains vengeance. There should have been some level of stress projected to the viewer, a sense that he will be identified or might fail, that the criminals might escape or turn the tables on him, but alas the writer or director chose not to pursue that angle in the movie. It could have been much much better. That being said, no matter how bad a movie, I always enjoy Cage, he does a movie good.

This movie showed great potential in the very beginning. There were good characters and great plot development. Then it just fell flat. I guess the vengeance was supposed to be due to the connection between the detective and the victim, but I never felt any connection between them. The actual vengeance was poorly developed and the ending was pretty lame. There are better movies to watch.

Acting is very good. Nicolas though is severely underused. Wasted even. The movie starts off very promising, like a space rocket taking off. The plot advances and just when you expect the movie to jump into high gear it only sputters, fizzles, and rapidly loses altitude. Finally showing to be a dud with a script that simply goes nowhere. Feels like a made for TV cop show movie. The failing is not the actors. They were all very good. The script is to blame.

If you have time to kill with nothing else to watch then OK. Watch it for the acting. Otherwise, pass.

Enter, Nic Cage, been the butt of several jokes, but when you sit down and watch this movie, hes totally different, he does not feel weird and quirky, hes solid, like a rock. Empty almost and hating what hes doing but you can tell he needs to do it to sleep better. Not a wonderful film, but definitely worth a watch if you hate scumbags.