From Paris with Love (2010)

Recently added to the Netflix watch instantly queue, we decided to watch From Paris with Love tonight.  The film stars John Travolta and Jonathan Rhys Meyers.  Yet again we have a film about the generic USA stereo type that all muslims are terrorists.  Yay, that puts us off to a great start!


I am usually a Travolta fan.  There are very few films I don't at least like of his.  This was was an exception.  I did not particularly like the film, and I thought Travolta could have done a better job.  He seemed to me that as of recent, he is trying to get more into the "badass" character with films such as Pelham 123.  He has such a huge range of acting ability it is crazy, and I hate to see him pigeon hole himself this far into the game.  John, please do something else.  You are good at the action films, but please take a break and do something else.

Speaking of unhappy acting, lets look at Jonathan Rhys Meyers.  Hmmm, I was not familiar with him prior to this film.  Not only was I not familiar, now I am also not impressed.  His acting in the film left a lot to be desired from me.  On a random side note, I think he is a cross between Joaquin Phoenix and Justin Bartha.  Not only in looks, but in acting as well.  Joaquin has his I don't give a shit quality, portrayed in such films as Walk the Line.  Justin has his uptight seems kind of like he has a stick up his ass quality in such films as National Treasure.  Please don't get me wrong, I think both of the later two can act, I am not saying they cant.  I am just pointing out one of each of their acting styles that I think combine to create Jonathan Rhys Meyers.

Now that we have slashed apart the two main characters acting, lets slash apart the feature film shall we?  Where or where to begin...hmm.  Lets start right at the beginning when...sorry...*yawn*...pardon me I got bored and almost fell asleep.  Kind of like in the beginning of this film!  Ok, I am back from the fridge with a glass of Baileys, lets continue.  Once Travolta enters the film, hang on because it is one wild ride!  One wild ride straight to over acting and ridiculously stupid stunts.  There are a few things that have always bothered me about action films like this.  First is why the hell are all of you bad guys waiting in line to attack?  Are you fucking retarded?  Who trained you to fight, Mr. Rogers?  Another thing that bothers me about action films like this one is the fact that all the bad guys are shooting blanks.  I mean, how else could they shoot 100's of bullets to Travolta's one clip and he kills all of them and they don't even get close to him?  Blanks like in one of my favorite films of all time, Crash.  Oh what?  I'm sorry, if you have not seen the number one film on Netflix's top 100 for 6 years running, then it is your own fault.  Most of all, who the fuck hangs out of a car speeding down the freeway weaving in and out of cars holding a god damn rocket launcher?

Sorry about that tangent, I am all fired up tonight.  I have not seen an action film with this much potential go this bad with one exception that by far takes the cake: The Expendables.  From Paris with Love was not near as bad as that spoiled hunk of beef sent through the mail not in a cooler.  Yeah, imagine that!  And then imagine that it actually happened to someone I know and they were going to eat it!

Wow, where is my head tonight?  My Baileys is empty, and I have determined this was one of the most fun blogs that I have written so far.  Wouldn't you agree?  How about you leave your comments below and we can talk about it!

Oh yeah, time to rate this garbage.  Well, it was not all bad.  The premise of the film was good, and most of the supporting characters were acted and cast quite well.  The script was not half bad, it was just directed shitty and main character acted bad.  It was somewhat enjoyable however, so I can't bring myself to rate it less than a two star.  I feel bad rating it that way, but looking back over my review and comparing to other three star films I have rated I can't bring myself to bump it up...something the director and both John and Jonathan should have done.  Boo yeah, how you going to diss yo' mama?