Taken movie discussion.
Introduction: I loved first Taken movie. Like a lot. When it came out I was 21, and I felled for it, felled for its politics. I was unaware of its hateful rhetoric, I agreed with its Islamophobic, racist views of the world. I was a product of the propaganda at the time, and I am extremely ashamed of it.
After some time, my process of transformation, de-radicalization, and de-programming in terms of politics, but also my personal perception of the world began. I read Fromm, Lacan, Deleuze, Foucalt, Zizek, Roudinesco, Baudrillard and at the same time, I started psychoanalysis with lacanian psychoanalyst, which lasted for several years.
Fast forward to present day, I have a wife, two children, son and daughter. I was commuting from work, 1-hour ride, and felt, yeah I’d watch something. Started watching Taken and I was shocked.
Before we go forward, there is something to say about this kind of movies. Taken re-started and perfected the genre of angry middle age (white, but not only, as Equalizer shown us), divorced dads who are phantasizing about violence, as a sign of powerlessness and frustration that has no way out. Revenge flicks where always present, but Taken gave it another spin.
The way this kind of movies work, are as follows, first part is the boring setup before the action begins. It’s mostly based on reality, people sees injustice, threats of violence, someone close to main character is being hurt/abducted/killed. It’s just a cover to unleash the violence on the screen.
The second act, is where the phantasy begins. It’s so different than act 1, that is almost ridiculous. In Taken, the first act is about Bryan/Liam Neeson who is trying to reconnect with his daughter. He fails, because he doesn’t care, he has an emotional burden with his daughter that has not been resolved by him in any way. In this part, he’s shown the way he is in reality, a pathetic loser. The way he speaks, the way he looks, acts around his family. He thinks he’s badass, but he’s not. It’s so cringe it’s hard to watch. He feels underestimated, he would like to show what he can do, but his ex-wife and her new husband look down on him as if he were a loser. And he is, but this is just a build up to act 2. Second part is just pure Fox News propaganda. I mean it’s so over the top, that it’s ridiculous. You know, Europe, France and Paris especially is where the rapist are. There are no real men, they’re being cucked by the Muslims. Our poor Bryan warned everyone that her daughter shouldn’t go to Paris, he knows how the world looks like you know. He’s badass CIA or some other operator. A preventer. Nobody listened to him, so as soon as his daughter left the plane with her friend, she was harassed by some Muslim trafficker. You know, like in real life. Women are being literally snatched from the airport by Muslim gangs in Paris, and the cucked French police can do nothing about it. I mean come on, it’s so manipulative, racist and stupid. But sadly, it works. Bryan confronts his ex-wife and her rich husband, he’s so agitated and visibly happy to show everybody that – A-ha I was right, look I will save my daughter, I will show you that you were wrong about me. It’s pathetic. After his daughter is TAKEN, Bryan flies to Paris to investigate the crime scene. When he found out a picture of the trafficker from the airport, he did what every professional CIA operator would do. Beat him up and throw under a truck. You know, the classic, standard procedure. When he confronted the Albanian kidnappers, posing as his friend from French intelligence (speaking in English, nothing suspicious of that), the ideology of the movie spilled out from the screen:
“You come to our country, take advantage of our system, and think because we are tolerant, we are weak, and helpless. Your arrogance offends me. And for that, the rate just went up another ten percent”.
I mean damn. What the fuck is going on here? You’re trying to find your daughter or are you on a personal mission trying to defeat the evil that you identify with immigrants for some reason. It’s very convenient and fits in with the right-wing rhetoric. And of course the torture scene, it’s basically porn, scene is shown in a way to give a sense of pleasure. For some, maybe even sexual pleasure. This guy (lazy, breaking the law, snatching our precious women, of course Muslim) is being tortured, he got what he deserved. So that’s the way to deal with this kind of issues. No systemic reforms, no integration into society. You coerce them with violence. That’s the ideology of this movie. If you haven’t got any strong opinions about immigration etc, after watching Taken you will have ready-made answers. And of course his daughters friend is fucking dead. Why? Because she’s a whore. She’s not as pure as his daughter. She deserved it. I mean it’s sickening. The whole narration, its psycho-sexual undertones. His daughter is alive because she’s precious on the human trafficking market, because she’s a virgin. There are no virgins in Europe you know, only God blessed Americans are pure.
Beside the racist, fascist ideology, the psyche of Bryan is conflicted, it is unable to cope with the fact that his daughter is maturing and she wants to decide for herself who should be her sexual partner. It is this conflict that is the cause of his outbreak of violence. In his mind, even the slightest chance that his daughter is going away alone and she will have an intimate relationship with someone causes enormous stress. So we can say that what is shown after act 1 is a product of his phantasies. The fact that she was kidnapped and someone could take her virginity, it’s too much for him, he must save her. Not to save her life, but to protect her virginity.
Well that’s Taken for you. What the fuck is wrong with Luc Besson.
You could say, b-but wouldn’t you do anything for your daughter? Wouldn’t you go for a murdering rampage to save her? No. As a parent, when something happens to your kids, you have to do anything to keep them safe and to look after them. Look after their mental health, do everything so that the inflicted wound heals. There is no room for revenge, rampage and violence. It’s just in your head. You fucking moron.
Taken is like American Psycho if it was unironic. Everything after the first act should be understood as a stress induced hallucination in Neeson’s character and then the daughter should just show back up after a week when she gets back from her totally uneventful trip. Would be a far better film
And we see pictures from her trip to Paris, taken with some Middle Eastern men she befriended in the youth hostel.
He’s a little grumpy, what was she thinking? Doesn’t she know there are no-go zones in Paris? Fox news told me about it. But then he meets the guy, talked about baseball, they’re best friends now.
This gives me so much insight into the psychology of every early gen-x dad I’ve ever known. Thanks for sharing!
I mainly find that movie funny at the suspension of suspension of disbelief that the audience is supposed to have that someone could blow up an airport in Paris and somehow not be immediately arrested/shot. The movie was made after 9/11 as well. Do Americans just not believe that foreign countries have cops or something
Liam Nesson’s story of fantasizing about beating up the one black guy in Dublin is pretty funny. One of the better recurrent cumtown bits
And of course his daughters friend is fucking dead. Why? Because she’s a whore. She’s not as pure as his daughter. She deserved it. I mean it’s sickening. The whole narration, it’s psycho-sexual undertones. His daughter is alive because she’s precious on the human trafficking market, because she’s a virgin. There are no virgins in Europe you know, only God blessed Americans are pure.
Taken literally uses staple tropes ripped straight from 80s slasher films. The virginal Final Girl survived because she started following her dad’s rules.
“Cabin Fever” cleverly reversed the order of who dies when.
PAN-CAKES! :knifecat:
What makes the Islamophobia really pop to me is how old the script clearly is - the daughter character is going to Europe to follow fucking U2 on tour.
It’s like “Oh yeah it’s 2006 we need something with pro-war red meat for libs and chuds, so pull up that old script from '94. Script editing? Yeah we’re not doing that.”
“But dad we’re going to go listen to Cab Calloway and smoke Jazz Cigarettes!”
It took me multiple confusing paragraphs to stop thinking “Tangled” where you had clearly written “Taken”.
:same-picture:
Oh shit, the “never let anyone cut your hair” was totally a virginity thing
Oh shit, your’re right.
Her hair gets its powers from a magical flower, and cutting it “de-flowers” her, in a way. Just thought of this now
Wasn’t Taken based on the stories of an ex-fed who turned out to actually be completely full of shit?
stories of an ex-fed
completely full of shit
:shocked-pikachu:
You could say, b-but wouldn’t you do anything for your daughter? Wouldn’t you go for a murdering rampage to save her?
An adventure in incoherence:
My brother is a Sorkin-brained libs lib, but he also absolutely believes he is the “righteous violent badass” that will merc anyone who threatens his personal friends (all adult women who he feels he is the protector of…ughhhh). Anyway, here’s a fun experiment, try asking their opinion on US foreign policy crimes. I asked him about the famous Madeleine Albright quote about 500000 children dying in the middle east from sanctions being “worth it,” and he literally just said “we have our interests.” After that, steer the conversation toward why reform doesn’t work under capitalism to get the ol’ reliable, “Oh, so you advocate using violence, eh? You have such a strong political position that you have to use force, eh?”
And yes, he does consider himself a sophisticated political thinker.
Ask him if he was the father of one of those 500000 children what he would do to the US to avenge them as a righteous violent badass and see if you can get him to admit that the US brings terrorism on itself.
That’s when they go mask off and say they deserve it anyway because they are muslims.
You can’t reason with most of these chud types. Push them far enough and they will eventually drop the moral facade.