Man on Fire review

 Number 546 on the top 1000 films of all time is Tony Scott's action thriller Man on Fire.

John Creasy (Denzel Washington) is an alcoholic former CIA officer with PTSD. When his friend Paul Rayburn (Christopher Walken) convinces him to become a bodyguard for the Ramos family in Mexico, he is initially reluctant. However, he soon forms a close relationship with Lupita 'Pita' Ramos, (Dakoto Fanning) daughter of the Ramos.' When she is abducted by a kidnapping gang, Creasy promises to rain down hell on her kidnappers.

By their very nature, action films tend to be cliched and formulaic. You get the handsome, physically fit hero with a troubled past and plot armour, lots of explosions and guns, gratuitous violence and a simplistic plotline. Man on Fire had all of this in spades. The only thing was missing was an attractive female lead whose only function would be as a sex object for our rugged protagonist. Man on Fire was pretty cliched as far as action films go. Creasy is haunted by an unexplained past which is never really fleshed out. And that certainly didn't make him anymore three dimensional. 

Upon finding out information about Pita's kidnappers, he resorts to violently torturing members of the gang. And some of his methods were so violent that they bordered on silly. He sticks an explosive up a corrupt policeman's rear and detonates it when he has the information he needs. His plot armour was ridiculously thick. How many gunshot wounds does he survive? 

I also think the villain of the film was cliched. Roberto Sosa plays Daniel Sanchez who is otherwise regarded as 'the Voice.' But we don't see enough of 'the Voice' or his motivations to really make him a threatening enough villain. He's the one giving the orders but he doesn't have enough screen time to make him particularly scary. And there was also too much slow-motion and in really strange places too. Why did we need to see Creasy help Pita out of the pool in slow-motion? 

Lastly, Radha Mitchell plays Pita's mother and while she was good enough her accent was not. Radha is Australian and her character was supposed to be Texan. However, Radha's accent was very inconsistent. At time it sounded Texan and at others it just sounded generic American.

Despite all that, it was still an entertaining and, most importantly, a thrilling film. Washington and Fanning had a great chemistry and it was lovely seeing their relationship develop. Creasy starts off as morose and grumpy, but Pita helps to bring him out of his shell. They were very cute together. And I also enjoyed the gritty, visual style. Apparently it was a homage to the brilliant film City of God. The two films also shared a similar cast. 

I'm not sure whether I would count this as one of the top 1000 films of all time. But as an action-thriller film, I think it was very good.