The Next Three Days (2010)

An outstanding thriller with solid cast performances throughout. The Pittsburgh setting is a breath of fresh air and the tempo of the movie is its great strength. Moments of touching emotion tempered with fast paced action sequences. The story of an ordinary person put into a vulnerable and dangerous setting is always fascinating. You find yourself thinking, "what would I do in that situation?" There are very few plot holes, if any. No ridiculous special effects or unrealistic fight sequences that plague so many movies in the genre. I decided to buy the French version "Pour Elle" to make my own comparison of the two films. The reviews here that praise it unequivocally and heavily criticise the Russell Crowe version are way off base. the French version is mediocre at best. It lacks realism, the acting is wooden and setting is vague. The police and prison officers are not as intimidating, the parents of the lead actor are weak and the chemistry between the husband and wife is unconvincing. Just because it has subtitles does not make it any better!

Let's face it: in today's Hollywood, far too many movies are produced to strictly be cash cows, "popcorn flicks", or strictly vehicles for rising stars. While there is nothing wrong with that formula from a business point of view, it does serve to clutter/bog down the cinemas with largely irreverent fare. Fortunately, "The Next Three Days" is a shining example of how a film SHOULD be made.For a basic plot summary, this film focuses on the Brennan family. When wife Lara (Elizabeth Banks) is imprisoned for 20 years on a murder charge (her guilt/innocence is unknown until later on in the movie), husband John (Russell Crowe) hatches a scheme to break her out and take their son Luke out of the country to start a new life together. Along the way, John Brennan gets advice from a former prison escapee (Liam Neeson), must piece together a plan, and then finally decide if he deems himself capable of pulling it off.This movie will not immediately jump to the top of your "all-time favorites" list. What it will do, however, is entertain you for 2+ hours with intriguing characters, an interesting storyline, and enough plot twists to keep you guessing. It's simple (yet cognitive) entertainment at its finest: sit back, immerse yourself, and stay along for the satisfying ride.Besides the immersive storyline, the acting is also an "added bonus". Crowe and Banks are quite capable of carrying the leading roles, while Neeson, Olivia Wilde, Daniel Stern & even Brian Dennehy have excellent supporting roles, as small as they may be. Very much reminiscent of earlier Crowe films like "The Insider" & "State of Play" where the "surround Crowe with auxiliary talent" formula also paid off big.Thus, "The Next Three Days" is a very entertaining film (though perhaps not an outright classic) that I wish more Hollywood studios would copy. The acting is great, the plot is exciting, and the pacing is excellent. You'll never be looking at the DVD timer to see how much is left, that is for sure.

When it comes to thrilling action movies, this one really had it all for me. It is VERY suspenseful, and maintains a good pace throughout. And not only is it thrilling, but it also gave me lots to think about long after the credits rolled.Russell Crowe plays John, a man whose wife is convicted of murder. He is convinced that she is innocent and becomes determined to break her out of jail. This creates a lot of suspenseful situations as soon as he starts to prepare. It got me thinking about a lot of things, including the moral dilemmas John faces.There is a great Liam Neeson cameo where he gives John advice, since he has escaped from prison several times before. He warns John of the intense hurdles and sacrifices he will have to make, so I very quickly realized that the stakes and risk are very high if he goes through with it. The fact that I don't know if the wife is actually innocent or not, adds another layer of depth to the story. I was left trying to decide if John is making the right choice to break her out, which forced me to try and decide if she actually did it. Being so unsure how to feel, it really drew me in, and got me paying attention to every little detail in the movie. Haggis is great at throwing in little clues and nuances in the performances that made me question and re-think things.John is obviously a good guy, so I was rooting for him to succeed, but it is hard to know how to really feel about his character. Russell Crowe is great at playing characters that seem slightly insane, and it's hard to decide just how crazy he really is. They have a son, around 10 years old, and this makes his decisions all the more important. He is risking leaving this kid with both parents in jail if he screws up, but it will also re-unite the kid with his mother, who may be innocent.Overall, it is a very clever movie that is well crafted. The biggest strong point for me is really the script. It's a smart script that is well thought through. I can tell that Haggis understands what the viewer will be thinking and feeling during the experience and he times things perfectly to make for a fun, exciting, and thoughtful experience.Beside the writing, the acting was also very good. Russell Crowe brought a lot of depth to the character. The only criticism I have is that it is somewhat hard to believe that he would actually do this. He seems like a little bit too soft and reserved of a character to do these things, but in a way, that adds to the suspense because it makes us more unsure if he will pull it off. Elizabeth Banks is pretty good as the wife. I'm a little unsure how to feel about her performance. My main problem with her is that I didn't really like her character very much, she comes across as a bitch. I understand why that needs to be an element of her performance, but I would have liked to learn a little more about her positive traits to understand why John loves her so much. I think a few tweaks to her character development and a little more edge to John's character, could have increased how believable the story is. The only other criticism I can think of, is that Haggis clearly is a great writer who understands the story and did a fabulous job directing the actors and their actions, but there is not a lot of creativity or style in the way things were filmed. The camera work and cinematography was mostly pretty straight forward, and I would have liked to see a little more creativity in that department. Maybe some extreme close-ups, or interesting angles and framing. I would have liked to see Haggis hire a cinematographer that brought a little more to the table to make this movie a great visual experience in addition to being a great emotional experience.If you like intense movies that keep you on your toes and give you lots to think about, don't miss this one!

Russel crowe is one of the most recognisable names in Hollywood so I'm interested in anything he is in and I thought this was an alright film. The premise sees a school teacher try and break his wife out of prison and reunite his family. Now this movie only works because of the fantastic performance from russel crowe. He is a truly damaged character who just wants to have his family and his old life back and he will do anything to get it. You root for him but at the same time realise that maybe he is going to far. Elizabeth banks was good as his wife and there was allot of intrigue about the character and their chemistry worked for me. The kid was also pretty good in this movie. There are quite a few characters in this movie that are pointless and unnecessary such as the cops, crowes parents and Olivia Wilde's character that dragged down the film. I like the premise of the story, it is really interesting and I also really like the character development that crowe has. But like I said before there are just too many pointless filler plot threads in this movie and also I think the ending could have been done in a better way. The script wasn't that interesting at all with the dialogue being the main weakness of the film and also some things that characters do comes across as illogical. The style was really cool, I loved the suspense in the film and the action scenes that happened were really cool too. Overall this is a decent movie but I don't really care to see it again.