Abduction

 
  Taylor Lautner of Twilight fame is clearly desperate to expand his fanbase. Why else would he star in a mindless, hopeless, piece of teen bait that has been ruthlessly advertised since its theatrical release? Oh right... its what he's been doing all along. Why stop now?

  Its actually sad at this point. I mean I'm sure he loves where he's at. Legions of screaming fangirls. Dying to be with him. Lets face it, he may be playing second fiddle to that other guy, but still. I hear he gets lots of shirtless scenes. Despite all that, he's still stuck in a critically reviled franchise.  Aside from angsty romance-hungry teen girls, and bored harlequin-reading housewives, no one else is INTO Twilight. Everyone else can see they suck. No pun intended.

  So with Abduction, which is mercilessly advertised as a heavy hitting action movie, it confuses me from a certain standpoint.  On one hand, it looks like he's trying to break free from his ever-growing stereotype, but in the movie he does little that isn't pandering to his legions of fangirls.  The inclusion of such seasoned actors like Alfred Molina and Sigourney Weaver is puzzling to say the least. They're given little to do, and even less screentime in which to do it.  It'd almost be commendable to Taylor, if this movie had been good. Unfortunately, the great cast, decent editing, and competent action choreography do little to elevate it above anything worth seeing.

  The typical high school teen drama crap is of course first runner up here. Its tired. Its boring. I've seen it a billion times. I almost couldn't sit through it in Fright Night, but Anton Yelchin is charming and has charisma. Lautner does not. He can play popular teen well enough, but in the first half hour the only interesting thing is his parents.  They're pretty well acted.  I only wish we had more time with them.  Not soon after the ball gets rolling, the story forcibly shoehorns in a love interest and writes the parents out of the equation.  The young actress playing his girlfriend-to-be, is not bad in the role, shes a competent actress. But dammit the mere existence of her role dilutes the movie even further.  By the time you realize she's been sucked into this 'game of life and death' you realize that it was merely a maneuver by a writer penning a script. And a bad writer at that. Her inclusion is so obviously forced, its distracting, annoying, and the second big black mark towards this movie.

  The plot is already so bland and standard, I can't believe they actually went nowhere interesting with it.  You wanna break your stereotype? Then break it.  Star in something that'll push the envelope.  The story and the plot feels afraid to go places. Dark places, thought provoking places. Anything remotely interesting. His acting skills aren't challenged at all here. The story seems written around his apparent inability to act. His lines are written so poorly, that even a good actor would have a hard time convincing us someone would actually talk like this.  He delivers them flat and without emotion. I can't say I'm honestly surprised though. These are the same kind of complaints that I've seen hurled at the Twilight movies.

  If anything good can be said about the movie, is that it has some decent editing.  It showcases alot of the action scenes nicely. But when the action scenes themselves aren't much you haven't seen before, good editing isn't going to do it a huge favor or anything.  So after a dismally mediocre story, an incredibly predictable plot, and some pretty wooden performances all around... who the hell am I supposed to reccomend this to?

Self respecting movie-goers?
Save your money. Find one of the Bourne movies and watch any one of those instead.

Fangirls?
Eat up. He has a shirtless scene.