The second remake of the Spanish film EL DESCONOCIDO (2015) after Christian Alvart‘s DON‘T. GET. OUT has the same simple premise: family father Matt is taking his two kids (Lilly Aspell und Jack Champion) to school after having a fight with his wife Heather (Embeth Davidtz).A fter a few minutes in the car, he received a phone call from an unknown caller. There‘s a bomb under the driver‘s seat that could explode with the smallest weight change in the vehicle. Thus begins the search for the mysterious caller, the desperate attempt to keep the children safe, and a manhunt for Matt, who is being portrayed as the bad guy by the perpetrator. All of this is happening on the streets of Berlin. Director Nimród Antal doesn‘t quite succeed in keeping the tension up during the 90 minute runtime. This is due to unimaginative direction as well as a standard narrative style. The same camera angles focus on scared Matt, his children, the bomb or the phone, and the short drone footage can‘t take us out of the rut. Instead of doing some Berlin sightseeing and having Matt rushing from one interesting place to the next, the only indications that this film is set in Germany are the Berlin license plates and the police. The character motivations are also textbook. Matt‘s only goal is protecting his family, while his adversary is all about money. Even though Neeson‘s acting is solid as usual and he is even allowed to show weakness and vulnerability as Matt, RETRIBUTION is, above all, uninspired.

Lukas Hoffmann

Translation: Elinor Lewy