Review of Seeking Justice (2011) by Mike

Title: Seeking Justice (2011)

Original UK Release Date: 18^th November 2011

Original US Release Date: 16^th March 2012

UK Rating: 15

US Rating: R

Director: Roger Donaldson

Genre: Thriller

Plot: After his wife is raped, Will Gerard (Nicolas Cage) is approached by a stranger who tells him that for a favour at a later date he will “take care” of the attacker. When the time comes for him to repay the favour he has second thoughts and his life spirals out of control.

Mike's Review

            This film is about a group of vigilantes that find you after a crime has been committed against you or your family. They offer to kill the offender in exchange for a future favour from you. The favour turns out to be you killing someone that is guilty of a nasty crime.

            I am a fan of Nicolas Cage. He has starred in some great films but he has also been in his fair share of bad ones. After seeing the trailer for this I had high hopes for another great one. Including him there is a great cast including Guy Pearce, January Jones, Jennifer Carpenter, Harold Perrineau & Xander Berkeley this combined with an interesting premise gave the film a good chance to be something great.

            However the makers of the film seemed to forget all the good things they had to work with and ended up making a standard throwaway film. Jennifer Carpenter who is great in the series Dexter and the films Quarantine and Faster is hardly used. The same goes for Xander Berkeley and Harold Perrineau they pop up a couple of times but none of them are used to their full potential. Guy Pearce plays the “baddie” in the film but he needed to be more menacing. Nicolas Cage is in pretty much every scene and it is very much his film. Fortunately he plays a character that he has played many times and it is a formula that works for him. The confused hero that is out of his league and has to overcome great adversity to survive. It is one of his better performances and together with January Jones they really save the film.

            The film needed to have more of a feeling of threat and danger for the main characters, the chase scenes are over before they seem to have begun, and the climax to the film seemed to be rushed and lacks the danger you expect.

            However this is still a good film as long as your expectations aren’t too high. It is enjoyable and as I said Nicolas Cage is good in this. This is a very watchable film. The direction in this is good but I would expect no less from Rodger Donaldson who directed The Bounty (1984), Cocktail (1988), Dante’s Peak (1997) & The Recruit (2003).

            Give it a go if you are a Nicolas Cage fan, if not then this may not be the film for you.

7 out of 10

Additional Information

Trailer