Welcome to A-Z Movie Reviews. Every Sunday, for the next several months, I will be posting a review of a film in my home movie collection. How it works is, I will be reviewing movies in alphabetical order until I get to the letter Z (Yes, I do have a film that ends in Z). Now I realize there are many ways to alphabetize a film collection but this is mine so don’t judge me. This is simply for fun.
When I watch a movie and discover a new actor, often I will continue to follow their career to support other projects they do. That’s what I did with Taylor Lautner when I watched him in Abduction.
I knew nothing about him obviously, until the Twilight franchise. After I saw him in Twilight, I liked him so much as an actor that I wanted to check out more of his work. Most of the projects he had done were supporting roles with the exception of The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lava Girl, yes I did watch it and that’s all i’ll say.
In Abduction, Taylor plays Nathan, a teenager who learns his whole life has been a lie. After being assigned a group project about missing children for his Sociology class, his partner, and longtime crush Karen (Lily Collins) stumbles upon a website with age progression photos. While looking through the photos, they find one that strangely resembles Nathan when he was a child. I mean the kid is literally a dead ringer for him.
After Karen goes home, Nathan looks at the photo again and lets the age progression run and is shocked to see the adult version of himself staring right back at him. Needless to say, he has a lot of questions for his parents Mara (Maria Bello) and Kevin (Jason Isaacs). Nathan takes the information he found and messages someone he thinks is a woman working for the missing childrens site. Unbeknownst to him, the person is a male enforcer for a dangerous assassin named Nikola Kozlow played by Michael Nyqvist.
Nathan digs deeper into his past and enlists his best friend Gilly (Denzel Whitaker) to help him figure things out. Once he has the information he needs, he then confronts Mara to demand the truth. Before she and Kevin can tell him everything, they are attacked by Kozlows enforcers and murdered. After this happens, Nathan goes on the run with Karen who showed up at his house at the time his “parents” were being attacked.
While on the run, they are assisted by his therapist Dr. Bennett (Sigourney Weaver). Nathan learns that she is not really a therapist at all. She tells him she worked for the CIA and was an undercover agent with his real father Martin Price (Dermot Mulroney). Dr. Bennett then warns him of who he can and cannot trust. Nathan is still not clear as to why Kozlow is coming after him until he meets up with another CIA agent, Frank Burton (Alfred Molina).
Agent Burton informs him the reason he is being hunted is because of his father Martin. Martin has taken a list of 25 encrypted names of US Politicians and Intelligence Officials who have sold state secrets to foreign enemies. Kozlow wants the list and if he can get his hands on Nathan, he can be used as a bargaining chip to get Martin to hand it over. Pretty fucked up if you ask me. Your dad is out of your life for 15 years and then when he pops up, it’s for something you had absolutely nothing to do with.
Nathan realizes he himself has had the list since he and Karen have been on the run. It’s in a cellphone he picked up while hiding out at Martins safehouse. He doesn’t tell Burton he has it because he was warned earlier on by Dr. Bennett not to trust him. It dawns on him that Burtons name is on the list and after they are all attacked in a diner, he decides to take matters into his own hands.
Nathan sets up a meeting with Kozlow because he want this to end so he can get his life back. The two meet up at literally the worst place in my opinion. I know Nathan wanted a public space but, a baseball stadium in the middle of a game, with thousands of innocent spectators, yeah, probably not the best idea.
Nathan makes the mistake of letting his guard down and Kozlow is able to get his hands on the gun he had brought with him. He is able to escape to the parking lot where he and Kozlow have a final showdown. Kozlow is about to kill Nathan when an unseen Martin takes him out.
Afterwards, Nathan talks to his father on the phone and tells him he wants him in his life. Martin tells him “I’m your father but I’ll never be your dad.” how messed up and sad is that? Nathan has nobody left in his life and his own dad tells him he can still never be part of his life. As Nathan continues to speak to his father on the phone, he sees a man standing across the street and realizes it’s Martin. Before he can walk towards him he’s gone. As much as it hurts him, Nathan is resigned to the fact that his dad has made his life choice so now he has to move on and live his.
Abduction is an action packed movie and I’d say it was great way for Taylor Lautner to step out of the Twilight universe and show he could play more than just Jacob Black.
Some other things I had to note while watching this film:
- Initially when Nathan’s “father” Kevin was boxing with him, I thought he was just being a dick but then I realized he was training him for what he knew would be coming at some point.
- Everyone needs a best friend like Gilly
- Taylor Lautner always looks sexy on a motorcycle
- Would I go on the run with Nathan if it involved crawling through a river and sleeping outside in the cold night? probably.
- If you are going on the run with someone, bring a damn jacket. Watching Karen holding her arms like she was cold all the time drove me nuts. Nathan grabbed a jacket before they left the house so why didn’t she?
Abduction is available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.
