Review Content - Mahfuz Sami Ahmed

Timeout – Taken Review

The next review I am going to analyse is the “Timeout” review of taken.

The reviewer Nigel Floyd uses formal language to communicate with the audience. It may suggest that the reviewer’s target is aimed at an older age group compared to Empire’s informal language.

Nigel Floyd focuses mainly on narrative, actors and directors of the film. The first section starts with a small amount of information on the director and producer and it also contains references to other films that the director and producer have worked on. Further into the review the reviewer talks about the narrative of the film, mainly focusing on the disruption of the film and the relationship between the two characters in the film.

The last section, talks about the main protagonist of the film “Liam Neeson” in depth and explains the effect of having a well-known actor playing a hard liner, through the character within the film.

Empire Magazine – Taken Review

I am going to be analyzing the review of “Taken” by Dan Jolin from The Empire Magazine.
I have chosen Empire Magazine because it is one of the bestselling magazines in the United Kingdom. Firstly, the layout of the review is very simplistic and it is most beneficial to the readers since it contains the star ratings, number ratings, cast, and crew and Film details. It also allows people who haven’t watched the film to get a general overview of the film.

Dan Jolin writes this review in a very structural format, there are 3 sections to the review, plot, review and lastly, verdict. He briefly describes what the story’s equilibrium is based on and then jumps to the review. I believe this is a good way of writing a review because the readers will be more interested in another person’s opinion on the film to judge their own opinion.

The review is very informal in my opinion and it gives the feeling that Dan Jolin is talking to friend rather than an audience. For example, when he says “This involves Daddy creepily obsessing over her 17th-birthday present”. This quote shows that it is very informal and a bit comedic despite the film’s genre being thriller/action.

An additional example of this is when Jolin says “she and her slutty (read: dead-meat) pal”. This is informal in my opinion because he uses the words dead-meat and slutty. In a formal review, you will not find words like this.

I believe the review is a bit stereotypical in some terms. For example, Jolin calls Arab’s “cold-eyed” which could offend some Arabs, however, since the review is extremely informal, individuals may let it off. Dan Jolin also mentions that the director is Pierre Morel and he feels it is a significant to state the fact that the director himself is French.

Lastly, Dan Jolin writes a sentence to conclude his review on Taken. Dan gives the film a rating of 1 star can says that it is “A venomous little actioner that mistakes bile for adrenaline” which I don’t really agree with but it is his opinion.