Unknown

After reading the plot summary I made a bet with myself as to whether I would give 4 or 5 stars. Unfortunately, I lost in both cases and I'm still quite disappointed. The whole movie kind of unfolds without surprises with a lot of unnecessary car chases. Only the excellent ending is above average. Otherwise nothing new under the sun. A little better 3 stars. (02/07/2011)

Liam “hard-guy" Neeson is hitting people again. Although this isn’t as effective as Taken, it is still very, very entertaining. The main problem of Unknown is the fairly strange screenplay that wanted to surprise so much that toward the end I was gritting my teeth at just how artificial it was. But I liked it. Both Diane Kruger and January Jones are nice to look at, Neeson is right at home in this type of role and Bruno Ganz got to me the moment he opened the door. Otherwise, nice car chases, easy-to-follow action and the story... erm, unusual. A decent genre movie. (26/05/2011)

The final plot resolution is very interesting and not at all predictable. The action is scarce, but when it occurs, it has drive, and in fact, it is all somewhat “Bourne-like”, including the excellently utilized winter and freezing Berlin full of gray streets, dirt, homeless people, contrasted by luxury hotels, cars, and Arab sheikhs. Everything around the mysterious group of people is cold, raw, and uncompromising, while on the other hand, Liam Neeson is very down-to-earth and believable (as it’s his standard). They relied on a proven template from recent years, and they definitely did not spoil the result, which is a skillfully directed story with good performances. Bruno Ganz is monumental. (22/07/2011)

Many reviews here mention something about a (dumb) punchline suffering from lapses in logic. Quite on the contrary, I think that the story logically (whether or not clever, is a different matter) links and smooths out apparent over-complexity and lapses in logic with something that makes sense, but you must bear in mind that this is a genre movie not pretending to be anything more, so it would be naive to expect anything sophisticated à la Hitchcock. And it works fine, the same as the story in the last thirty minutes. When you add to this the uncompromising Neeson, the snowy atmosphere of Berlin and the great car chases, then... You simply have a quality genre movie. (03/06/2011)

Amnesia, Berlin in winter, secret agents, car chases, a cold femme fatale, an Arab sheikh, a trustworthy and likeable woman taxi driver, a brilliant scientist, powerful people pulling the strings behind the scenes, hit men, an unexpected twist. And also a great cast. It’s all here, but only in a recycled and somewhat overdone form. In his previous Orphan, Jaume Collet-Serra managed to shake up some genre clichés, but that doesn’t happen here. The film’s only memorable scene is the chilling encounter between the excellent actors Bruno Ganz and Frank Langella. (01/05/2011)