“A Walk Among The Tombstones,” written and directed by Scott Frank (“Lookout”), deviates from the recent Liam Neeson trend. In this movie, unlike in recent Neeson star vehicles, the actor does not portray a do-gooder vigilante who knows everything and can save the day with his physical might.
Ever since “Taken,” the surprise summer hit of 2008, Liam Neeson has entered the action hero phase of his acting career. Though he demonstrated his comedy chops earlier this year in “The Lego Movie” and “A Million Ways to Die In The West,” directors have counted on his gruff voice, his weathered face and his imposing figure to draw audiences in fare like 2011’s “Unknown,” 2012’s “The Grey” and, most recently, the airplane thriller “Non-Stop.” It’s refreshing that Frank’s film takes the actor in another new direction.
Based on the 10th book of a crime novel series by Lawrence Block, Neeson stars as New York police officer Matthew Scudder, a role previously portrayed by Jeff Bridges in 1986’s “Eight Million Ways To Die.” When the film opens in a New York bar circa 1991, Scutter is off his beat enjoying a cup of coffee with two shots of whiskey when two gangsters blow the bartender’s brains out in the background. Scutter takes after them, and this character appears at first to be a familiar Neeson action hero, physically giving chase and gunning them down in the name of the law.
But when the film flashes forward to 1999, Scutter has changed. He works as a private investigator, attends Alcoholics Anonymous meetings at his local church and when he sits at a restaurant, the shot resembles an Edward Hopper painting, a man alone with his thoughts. He is a morally ambiguous, as he accepts a job by local cocaine kingpin Kenny Kristo (Dan Stevens, “Downton Abbey”), to find the perpetrators that kidnapped and killed his wife. This sends Scutter on a journey through the seedy underbelly of Brooklyn.
The film is a tightly paced thriller, and it benefits from not having many shoot-em-up action sequences typical of a Neeson vehicle. Rather, the violence is shown as gruesome and disturbing, something to be recoiled at. Shot on location in Brooklyn, chief director of photography Mihai Malaimare Jr. shoots an empty vision of the city, extreme long shots full of shadows and grey skies. The tombstones refer to those of Greenwood Cemetery, which is the backdrop for a nighttime shootout with the criminals.
Though it is overwhelmingly dark, the film has moments of levity provided by Scutter’s interactions with TJ (Brain “Astro” Bradley, “Earth to Echo”), a homeless teenage African-American youth who decides to become his sidekick. Inspired by Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, TJ helps Scutter out with Internet searches and questions the waitress’s motives at a restaurant when she gives him soda instead of water.
Although the film has a few problems, namely in its depiction of the female characters as either victims or invisible (Kristo’s wife is only depicted as a painting), as well as the nature of the criminals (it’s strongly implied that both are gay), “A Walk Among The Tombstones” is a Neeson thriller worth watching.
“A Walk Among the Tombstones” (R, 113 min) is now playing in theaters nationwide.
