Bruce Willis ended his acting career due to health problems. The aphasic “Last Boy Scout” star leaves behind a legacy that includes not only classics, but also many smaller genre gems that were, to some extent, often overlooked. “Hostage – Kidnapped“, which airs today, October 18 at 11:15 PM on Cable 1, is one of these highlights that you should definitely pay attention to again.
If today’s air date of “Hostage” is too late for you or you would prefer to watch the film without commercial interruptions, you can easily purchase the Blu-ray or DVD from online stores such as Amazon:
That’s what “Hostage – Kidnapped” is about
Jeff Talley (Bruce Willis) was previously responsible for negotiating with hostage takers at the Los Angeles Police Department. But when a hostage situation turns into a bloody catastrophe that leaves a young mother and her child dead, Talley is devastated and can no longer do police work in the big city. That’s why he decides to take the job as police chief in the small town of Bristo Camino, where crime is relatively low.
But the peace doesn’t last long: three small-time crooks (Jonathan Tucker, Ben Foster, Marshall Allman) break into a family’s property to get their hands on their luxury car. The silent alarm goes off and the burglars decide to kidnap the head of the family (Kevin Pollak) and his children Jennifer (Michelle Horn) and Tommy (Jimmy Bennett). Jeff Talley must now use all his skills to save the hostages…
A gripping hostage thriller that really gets under your skin
The plot of ‘Hostage’ certainly does not excel in ingenuity, but is limited to the classic conventions that you always see in the action thriller genre. However, the film avoids reducing the characters to mere caricatures or keywords, but takes the trauma of main character Jeff Talley very seriously. This gives ‘Hostage’ a tangible, realistic touch, which gains more and more depth and urgency thanks to the well-founded acting of the incredibly vulnerable Bruce Willis.
However, what is particularly striking about ‘Hostage’ is the all-encompassing darkness, which gradually makes the action thriller more realistic. Home invasion horror is becoming. Director Florent Emilio Siri is even more menacing here than many thoroughbred horror films before and after ‘Hostage’. The reason for this is that the violence that lies dormant within each character threatens to erupt in an extreme way at any moment. This gives the extremely exciting “Hostage” a gripping opacity that is impossible to escape.
In “Hostage,” at one point there seems to be only the dull light of a flashlight that is somehow able to break through the darkness of the hostage scenario – until the spectacular finale finally ignites a flaming inferno. Ben Foster is perhaps cast a little too obviously as a psychopath, but there is hardly any other actor who is so able to express madness and helplessness at the same time, simply through his eyes.
Overall, “Hostage” is a gripping, excellently directed thriller, which once again proves how strong, especially in view of the tragic end of Bruce Willis’ career and the accompanying direct-to-DVD films in which the former action icon appeared almost exclusively in recent years and Willis could be layered . In “Hostage” his Jeff Talley not only strikes, but also has to take a lot. That’s why the movie is so damn good.