Inescapable

Drama , Action, plot twists. This movie was a gem to find and watch for me

"I'm not the same man you chased away all those years ago. Find my daughter!" Years after he left Damascus under suspicious circumstances, Adib Abdel Kareem (Siddig) returns when he finds out that his daughter has gone missing. When he meets people from his past he is forced not only to confront his earlier life consequences but also find his daughter before its too late. This is a movie that is good, fast moving and worth watching, but also a little generic. There really isn't much to say about this one. Father finds out his daughter is missing, he is forced to seek help from those he has had previous problems with, encounters resistance. I did like the movie and I do think it's worth watching and while it is pretty tense I found that the daughter storyline seemed to have gotten lost in the jumble of what was going on. When you watch that will make sense. Overall, a movie that is good and well worth checking out but it is a tad generic. I give it a B.

Inescapable is a low budget generic action thriller with a Taken vibe. It is set in a Syria before they had civil turmoil with the Assad regime.

Alexander Siddig is Adib Abdel Kareem a man who fled Syria some years earlier as he was accused of being an Israeli spy. He has made a new life for himself in Canada.

He receives news that his daughter Muna (Jay Anstey) has gone missing in Damascus and must return to Damascus many years later to confront his past.

Adib enlists the help of an his ex-fiancée Fatima (Marisa Tomei) to help him while he is in Syria. He gets help from the Canadian embassy Paul (Joshua Jackson) and tracks down old associates and rivals such as Sayid (Oded Fehr.)

The unusual setting of Syria which is reality a police state gives the film some intrigue as you always have the sense of being watched and betrayal not being far behind.

The plot however does feel like Taken without much of the action and violence. Siddig is very effective in a meaty role but not a lot happens as he looks for clues to track down his daughter and stay one step ahead of his pursuers and double crossers. Its tense and watchable enough, Marisa Tomei lends it a lot of credibility but I felt it should had been a lot better.

In all honesty movies like Inescapable have been made before and way better. Inescapable is okay to watch once and then forget about it. It won't remembered as a great movie. The story itself isn't bad though, even if it has been done before. It's just some action scenes that brings the movie down. Not that there are a lot of it, but the ones where there are fighting scenes are clearly done by amateurs. None of them look real and that's the minimum you could ask from an action thriller. Alexander Siddig isn't a bad actor but fighting scenes are clearly not his thing. The cast is okay without having Oscar winning performances. All in all it's an okay movie, there are for sure worse movies than this one, but it's just not great either.

Adib Abdel Kareem (Alexander Siddig) lives a comfortable life in Toronto under an alternate identity. He has two daughters but has told them nothing about his past in Syria. He was a military intelligence officer but left under mysterious circumstances 20 years ago. His oldest daughter Muna has disappeared after going to Damascus behind his back. He sneaks back into the country with the help of ex-fiancée Fatima (Marisa Tomei). He talks to Canadian Embassy officer Paul Ridge (Joshua Jackson) and former fellow workmate Sayid (Oded Fehr) as he navigates the dangerous police state.

This movie seems to be caught between a realistic movie and a Bourne-like thriller. It fails as either and it struggles to be better. It's great to have Siddig as the lead. The problem is that I can't believe his character wouldn't be snatched up by any one of the random secret police agents. His supposed crime is too big to ignore. The daughter is too naive. It would have been more logical if she's researching in Turkey and gets kidnapped into Syria. Also having Tomei as an Arab does raise an eyebrow. A lot of little things limit the believability. It doesn't work as an action thriller either. It is terribly flat and has low intensity despite the exotic setting. The few action sequences seem weak and out of place. I would like a realistic take on the 2012 police-state Syria. I can't buy it here.