Review: From Paris With Love Is Not What it Sounds Like
- Jun 11, 2017
- 2 min read
While the title suggests a romantic film, one filled with sappy dialogue and bad acting, it couldn't be further from the truth. There are no moonlit dinners or strolls through the park to be found here.
Personal aid to the American ambassador in Paris, James Reece (Johnathan Rhys Meyers) has a mostly quiet life. Aside from some small scale espionage here and there, he doesn't get up to much. That is at least, until Charlie Wax (John Travolta) steps into his life. Wax is a trigger happy operative dispatched to locate a terrorist cell in Paris. His methods are less than unconventional, there's a lot of cocaine involved and a lot of people are going to die.
From Paris With Love is a strange case. Watching the trailer and reading about it led me to believe it was nothing more than a cheap action movie starring a washed up actor. And it is, but it's also so much more.
Travolta is at his all time best here. He's nuts, blowing people away with a grin, tossing out one liners like he has an excess of them and just being thoroughly entertaining. He tosses in a few Pulp Fiction references, swears like a trooper and can monologue about the importance of energy drinks. If you think you need more from an action star, you're dead wrong. The rest of the cast is fine but Travolta is so outlandishly ahead of them that they quickly become set dressing for his raw energy.
It is this same energy that fuels the explosive action scenes. They're creative, weird and often funny with a car chase involving a rocket launcher and a phone call being a major highlight. Travolta stabs and shoots his way across the city and no one is going to stop him.
From Paris With Love isn't a highbrow film but I'll be damned if it isn't a lot of fun. It takes a bit to get going but when it does get going, you're in for a ride you won't soon forget.
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