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A Walk Among the Tombstones

Starring: Liam Neeson, Dan Stevens, and David Harbour
Directed by: Scott Frank
Screenplay by: Scott Frank
Based on the novel by Lawrence Block

    There are movies about disturbing people who do disturbing things to others.  This film takes it to an uncomfortable new level.
    New York City, 1999: Matthew Scudder (Liam Neeson) is a former cop now turned private investigator.  He "does favors for people, and in return, they give [him] gifts."  A high profile drug trafficker named Kenny Kristo (Dan Stevens) needs Scudder's help.
    Kristo's wife has been kidnapped.  She's been killed even though he paid the ransom.  Kristo needs Scudder to find these people who killed his wife.  So, he will travel all over New York City trying to find these people, but what he finds will prove to be very disturbing.
    These men have found a new target and it is up to Scudder to stop them before they do something bad to another innocent victim.
    When we think of recent films starring Liam Neeson, we might think of films such as Taken and Non-Stop, films that involve him doing a lot of ass-kicking.  A Walk Among the Tombstones is not a film even remotely close to that.  This is a much slower paced film that requires much closer attention in order to follow everything that's going on.  There are a lot of details that audiences should keep track of in order to accurately figure out the mystery.  But while there are a lot of details, there aren't so many that audiences can get lost.
     Compared to some other recent mystery films (David Fincher's Zodiac and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo both come to mind), this is a relatively simple mystery.  Nothing is done too elaborately and nothing requires more than one detective to solve.  This is a film comparable to a famous mystery film starring Humphrey Bogart, The Maltese Falcoln (to which the film alludes to in a few places).
      We often watch Liam Neeson be the good guy chasing the bad guy in his recent films, and A Walk Among the Tombstones is no exception.  As I said before, it's just a slowed down version of what his recent films are.  This film doesn't require him to beat the crap out of people, nor does it have many action sequences.  This is a detective movie plain and simple, a huge plus for me.  It's a film about one person trying to out-smart the other, while not messing with the audiences heads too much.
      If you're a fan of watching films about disturbing things, then this is the movie for you.  It's easy to follow and will keep you interested the whole time despite its slow pace.  I definitely recommend this film.
      I give A Walk Among the Tombstones a B+.

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