In this film, the son of an airline owner was kidnapped under mysterious circumstances. The solution appears to be to give the kidnappers the required ransom, but the father appears in TV news and unexpectedly manages schedules. The man began offering the amount as an incredible reward for their leader.
That's interesting stuff, but it doesn't play out with a lot of smarts. And the opportunity to end Ransom on a creepy note of unpredictability is forsaken for the usual glass-shattering, bullets-flying finale.
Ransom benefits handsomely from a story that remains compellingly believable, even as the plot twists become more baroque. Be warned, though, that Ransom is a violent film, with bloody shootouts that will not be easy to watch.
Howard directs for speed and force. The movie moves so quickly it yanks you by too many niggling doubts and the action scenes are so good that you wonder why Opie hasn't shown this much vicious pizazz before.
There are more climaxes in here than in a Swedish blue movie. This is not to say you won't be thrilled, charged up and put through the ringer at times, but your intelligence will need to be shoved under your seat like warm, flat soda.
By the time Tom Mullen has turned into an action superhero in a clumsy climax, Ransom has run out of ideas, and we've lost track of what we felt about a father's frantic efforts to save his son.
A slick, slam-bang thriller about a business tycoon's frenzied efforts to get back his kidnapped son, Ransom is meant to divert and entertain. It does.
Orlando Sentinel
January 22, 2014
With a mechanical movie like this, filmmakers -- male or female -- can't take chances. Howard and company are hostages to their own conception.
Ransom is more cleverly conceived than most run-of-the-mill Hollywood exploitation thrillers, and for a while appears headed to a memorable, richly ironic conclusion.
The special nature of this story is its many climaxes that border on false endings and also how Gibson's character responds to the ransom demand of $2 million.... it is Gibson who sells us on it and sells it well.
