Samuel Pierret (Gilles Lellouche) is a nurse who saves the wrong guy -- a thief (Roschdy Zem) whose henchmen take Samuel's pregnant wife (Elena Anaya) hostage to force him to spring their boss from the hospital. A race through the subways and streets of Paris ensues, and the body count rises. Can Samuel evade the cops and the criminal underground and deliver his beloved to safety? Read more …
The game of chat and mouse that ensues manages to be gallopingly preposterous and an absolute blast, frequently at the same time.
Point Blank maintains a pulse-racing forward momentum with chases, narrow escapes, twists and betrayals.
Another sparkling thriller from the Anything For Her director. See it, then wait for the inevitable US remake.
Hits the target.
The whole picture is pretending to be a lot grittier than it really is, but the experience is breathless enough that we barely care.
Compulsively exciting French thriller.
It is entirely ridiculous, but it certainly rattles along at a fair pace.
Let's hear a fanfare for the common man.
The stakes are high but there is nothing mechanical about the film’s air of ruthless efficiency because we actually care about the characters. Gilles Lellouche creates a hero whose physical exhaustion and emotional anguish are all too believable.
The film packs in so much one is surprised to learn that it runs for less than 90 minutes. Even during the somewhat incredible denouement at a chaotic police station, Alain Duplantier's camerawork is so frenetic you don't have time to stop and question it.
A good idea but what follows is a long parade of repetitive growling, gunfights and near arrests.
Lellouche and Zem, while actors of some note in France, don't come with the kind of movie star baggage that frequently sabotages blockbusters. Instead they ground Point Blank and make it easier to buy into the ridiculous plot, which in this kind of film is essential.
There are no pauses for banter between the nurse and the deadpan crook – the humour is as quick and economical as everything else – but despite the breakneck speed and whiplashing plot twists, it's always clear what's happening, and it's all relatively logical.
The film is plausibly plotted and forcefully played, character is delineated through action, and there is no time for glib moralising.
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