Silent Night

Starring: Joel Kinnaman, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Scott Mescudi, Harold Torres, Vinny O'Brien, Yoko Hamamura

Director: John Woo

After being injured when his family is caught in the crossfire of a gang war, electrician Brian (Kinnaman) watches as everything he cared about is ripped from him. His young son was killed that day and soon after his wife Saya (Sandino Moreno) leaves him because he has let his life turn into a drunken mess. Although Detective Vassell (Mescudi) is willing to help, Brian takes it upon himself to find the man responsible, Playa (Torres), and get his revenge.

John Woo makes his long-awaited return to American cinema, with his last movie stateside being 2003's sci-fi dud Paycheck. Here, he returns to the gritty action film-making that shot Woo into international acclaim.

The conceit behind the movie is an interesting one, as not a word of spoken dialogue occurs between any of the characters. Sure there are news reports and radio with dialogue but that is it. It's a similar idea to No One Will Save You from earlier this year. You should probably go check that one out (seriously it's on Hulu and it's FANTASTIC) because the no dialogue idea works much better there.

The conceit doesn't really work and feels very forced and awkward because there are definitely times where the characters would have talked. The movie tries to cover for the lack of dialogue at times by having Brian and Saya text each other, even if they are just a room away. You wouldn't notice it as much if the action had picked up quicker into the story. It's over an hour before Brian begins to take his revenge and the lack of dialogue leads to a lot of awkward scenes that cause the film to drag. Granted, people really didn't go to see any of the Taken or Equalizer movies for the dialogue.

So is the action worth it? It's coming from the producers of the John Wick franchise expectations are unreasonably high before the trailers even start to roll. Once it gets going, its relentless, bloody and mostly well-choreographed. Because we aren't really given a lot of character development for either side of the equation, a lot of the action ended up coming off like a video game. Brian dispatches a lot of nameless, faceless henchmen and a couple of times they meet a character that feels like a boss battle. Woo also doesn't disappoint and incorporates a lot of his trademark slow motion (but thankfully no doves) and makes some interesting editing choices. The film is also dark, with a lot of the action taking part at night and some of the chaos gets lost. There is a pretty decent car chase and the final sequence in an abandoned warehouse is the best part of the movie. None of it comes close to anything in John Wick, which has set the bar too high for action films.

it's hard to critique the performance of Kinnaman, or any of the actors for that matter. We aren't given much development for Brian and the lack of dialogue doesn't really give you much to go on as the actors have to express more through their faces. This doesn't work well at all in the first half, which tries to be emotional but honestly comes off as silly. However, once Kinnaman begins his rampage its clear the dude is an action star. It would be fun to let Mescudi do an action film where he gets to be more involved; here he's only really showing off his chops in the last 15 minutes or so.

It was an interesting idea, and I can see why Woo would want to make his return with this film. It gave him a chance to do something unique, however it doesn't work as often as he would like it to. Its got some solid action though so it ends up not being a total dud.

Grade: C-